What is a Zombie API?

Zombie APIs threaten an organization's system security and efficiency. These forgotten, unmonitored APIs expose vulnerabilities to attackers, drain resources, and lead to compliance issues and data inconsistencies. Tackling zombie APIs is crucial for enhancing security, optimizing performance, ensuring regulatory compliance, and maintaining data accuracy.

In this blog, uncover the hidden risks of Zombie APIs and discover essential strategies to secure an organization’s data and API environment.

What is Zombie API?

Outdated or inactive APIs are Zombie APIs that continue to operate within an organization. They expose potential security vulnerabilities by leaving forgotten endpoints open for attackers to exploit. These APIs also consume valuable resources and create inefficiencies in the network. Legacy systems or poorly managed API inventories often cause Zombie APIs to persist. To eliminate these hidden threats, organizations need to perform regular audits and ensure proper API management.

Example of Zombie API

Imagine an organization develops an API endpoint for a feature that it later decides to deprecate. Even though the organization stops using the feature, the endpoint remains active on the server and is left unmonitored and forgotten. Without anyone maintaining or securing it, this endpoint becomes a Zombie API—an unintentional security risk within the organization’s system.

Hackers can exploit this forgotten endpoint to gain unauthorized access to sensitive data or disrupt operations, all without triggering alarms since no one actively monitors it. Additionally, this Zombie API continues to consume server resources like processing power and memory, adding unnecessary load to the system and driving up costs.

Zombie API Risks

Zombie APIs pose several significant risks to the system's security and performance. These include:

Security Vulnerabilities

When developers no longer maintain an API endpoint, they often do not provide the necessary updates and patches to address newly discovered security vulnerabilities. Over time, this makes the endpoint an attractive target for malicious actors.

Attackers could exploit these weaknesses to execute various attacks, such as SQL injection, cross-site scripting (XSS), or denial-of-service (DoS). The longer the endpoint remains active without proper monitoring and maintenance, the greater the risk that attackers will compromise it, potentially leading to a significant data breach or system infiltration.

Unauthorized Access

Forgotten endpoints can serve as hidden entry points for attackers looking to gain unauthorized access to the organization’s systems. Hackers might scan for and discover these unmonitored APIs, using them to bypass more secure entry points.

Once discovered, attackers could exploit these endpoints to access sensitive data, manipulate transactions, execute unauthorized commands, or even take control of critical system functions. This can lead to severe consequences, such as data theft, financial loss, or disruption of service, ultimately damaging an organization’s reputation and trustworthiness.

Resource Drain

Even though a deprecated API endpoint no longer provides any functional value, it continues to consume server resources, including processing power, memory, and bandwidth. This unnecessary consumption can slow down the system, degrade the performance of other critical services, and increase operational costs. In a cloud environment, it may also lead to unexpected charges, as organizations end up paying for resources that waste away on unused endpoints.

Compliance Risks

Zombie APIs can jeopardize compliance with data protection regulations like GDPR, HIPAA, or PCI DSS. Without proper monitoring and security controls, these forgotten APIs may expose sensitive data, leading to a violation of compliance requirements. Non-compliance could result in legal penalties, hefty fines, and reputational damage that could affect organizational operations.

System Instability

As unmonitored endpoints accumulate over time, they can introduce unexpected system behavior, including crashes, bugs, and errors. Zombie APIs, if left unmanaged, can interfere with the current organization's services, causing instability in critical systems and leading to unplanned downtime. This instability not only affects service availability but can also frustrate users and reduce overall system reliability.

Identifying Zombie APIs

Identifying Zombie APIs is crucial for maintaining the security, efficiency, and overall health of the organization’s API ecosystem. Zombie APIs, or outdated and forgotten APIs that continue to operate without proper monitoring can expose the organization’s systems to various security vulnerabilities, resource drains, and compliance risks.

Here are some key steps to help organizations identify Zombie APIs in the API ecosystem:

1. Conduct an API Inventory Audit

Start by conducting a full inventory of all active APIs within the organization. Compare this inventory with the documented API endpoints. Any discrepancies between active and documented APIs could indicate the presence of Zombie APIs. An audit helps organizations understand the scope of the APIs deployed in the API environment and highlights those that may no longer serve any operational purpose.

2. Monitor API Traffic

Use monitoring tools to track traffic across all API endpoints. Pay close attention to APIs that show little to no traffic over time. If an API endpoint has minimal or no usage and is not listed in the official documentation, it could be a Zombie API. This monitoring process also helps identify unused APIs that have been forgotten but remain live on the organization server.

3. Analyze Server Logs

Regularly review server logs to detect endpoints that are still being accessed but haven’t been actively maintained or updated. By analyzing logs, security teams can identify old or deprecated endpoints that are still handling requests, even though they are no longer necessary for the application’s functionality.

4. Engage Development Teams

Collaborate with the development teams to discuss any API endpoints they may have deprecated but not fully removed from the system. Developers often create APIs during the testing or development phase, but if these APIs are left live after the feature is deprecated, they become potential Zombie APIs. Regular communication with development teams ensures security teams are aware of any forgotten endpoints.

5. Review Deployment Pipelines

Analyze the deployment pipelines to understand how APIs are managed during feature deprecation or removal. Ensure that when a feature is no longer needed, security teams decommission and remove its related API endpoints from the system. An incomplete decommissioning process can leave Zombie APIs running, creating unnecessary security risks.

6. Check API Versioning

Older API versions that newer ones have replaced are prime candidates for becoming Zombie APIs. Review the API versioning system to identify any outdated versions still in use or running on the organization servers. Decommission and retire these versions if they are no longer necessary.

7. Investigate Third-Party Integrations

Third-party services or external integrations that rely on APIs might continue to use endpoints security teams have already deprecated internally. Investigate which third-party tools are accessing the APIs and ensure they are not interacting with obsolete or deprecated endpoints. Work with partners to ensure they migrate to current API versions.

8. Perform Security Scans

Use security scanning tools to detect any open or vulnerable API endpoints that security teams do not actively monitor. These scans will reveal APIs that might not appear in the regular logs or documentation but are still operational and could be classified as Zombie APIs. Security scans also provide valuable insights into potential attack surfaces within the organization’s system.

9. Implement Lifecycle Management Practices

Adopt API lifecycle management practices to ensure that security teams properly maintain API endpoints throughout their usage, including decommissioning them when they are no longer needed. Implementing a structured process for retiring APIs ensures they don’t remain active after their purpose has ended.

Scanning APIs for Vulnerabilities with Akto

Akto offers a powerful solution for scanning APIs and identifying vulnerabilities, enhancing the organization's API security posture. With its intuitive interface and comprehensive testing capabilities, Akto simplifies the process of detecting potential threats in the organization’s API ecosystem.

Let's walk through the steps to effectively scan the APIs for vulnerabilities using Akto.

You need an API collection to test for vulnerabilities. The docs provide various methods for creating a collection.

Step 1: Under API collections, select a collection that you want to test.

Step 2: Click on “Run Test” a dialog box will pop up named “Configure Test”.

Step 3: Select the vulnerabilities under Test Categories you wish to test or leave them as default to test for all vulnerabilities. Then, click on "Run Once Now".

Step 4: Visit "Testing" to view the test results and perform further analysis.

Final Thoughts

Zombie APIs pose a serious threat to the organization system’s security and efficiency, making it crucial to prevent their creation and manage existing ones effectively. Implementing strong API lifecycle management, maintaining accurate documentation, and conducting regular audits are key strategies to mitigate this risk. These proactive measures will help ensure a secure and well-maintained API environment. Discover how Akto can provide comprehensive API security solutions. Book your demo today and start safeguarding your APIs!