STRIDE

As explained in Secure APIs

STRIDE is a threat-modeling methodology that classifies threats as spoofing, tampering, repudiation, information disclosure, denial of service, or elevation of privileges.

STRIDE is a threat-modeling method for asking what can go wrong in an API or system. It classifies attacker strategies into six practical categories. section 2.2.2

Use the categories to brainstorm potential abuse and failure modes:

• Spoofing: stealing credentials or taking over accounts. section 2.2.2
• Tampering: corrupting data or performing unintended updates. section 2.2.2
• Repudiation: being unable to prove whether a user performed an action. section 2.2.2
• Information disclosure: leaking configuration details or sensitive data. section 2.7
• Denial of service: making the system unavailable. section 2.7
• Elevation of privilege: gaining administrative privileges without authorization. section 2.7

Apply STRIDE during threat identification and ranking by asking how attackers could steal tokens, bypass access controls, access another user’s data, or expose configuration. Team brainstorming helps generate candidates. section 2.2.2

Figure 2.5 Each threat category in STRIDE represents a strategy for breaking into our system or stealing data from our APIs.

Use the figure as a compact map of the six ways an attacker might break into an API or steal its data. section 2.2.2

How Secure APIs covers it

How deep it goes

Defines six threat categories and brainstorming prompts, but does not detail category-specific mitigations.

Examples

Uses stolen access tokens, bypassed access controls, cross-user data access, leaked configuration, and privilege escalation as threat prompts.

What you can do after

Evaluate API threats by classifying attacker strategies and generating candidates for team review.

How it connects

Connects threat modeling with application decomposition, response and mitigations, review and validation.

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Related concepts

• threat modelkind of · A threat model is a structured analysis or representation of a system’s relevant threats, adversaries, assets, attack paths, assumptions, and possible mitigations.
• spoofing attackhas part · A spoofing attack is a deceptive attack in which an adversary impersonates a legitimate identity, device, sender, signal, service, or other trusted entity.
• tamperinghas part · Data tampering is the unauthorized alteration, corruption, or replacement of data or code during transmission, storage, or processing.
• denial-of-service attackhas part · A denial-of-service attack is an attempt to make a system or service unavailable or degrade its ability to serve legitimate users by exhausting or disrupting its resources.

This explainer was generated by Manning's knowledge graph from the text of Secure APIs. The section links point to the parts of the book it draws on.