API Security tools protect APIs by monitoring, detecting, and preventing threats in real-time, ensuring that they keep sensitive data secure and they prevent unauthorized access. This blog explores some of the top API security companies or API security vendors and their features to help application security engineers choose the best API security tools for their unique organization needs.

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What are API Security Tools?

API security tools are essential for protecting APIs from various threats and vulnerabilities. As APIs become increasingly integral to software development and data exchange, the importance of robust security measures cannot be overstated.

These tools provide crucial features such as authentication, encryption, and access control to safeguard sensitive data and prevent unauthorized access. Moreover, they offer real-time monitoring and threat detection capabilities, enabling organizations to quickly identify and respond to potential security breaches.

Why are API Security Tools Important?

API security tools are important for several reasons, particularly as APIs become integral to digital transformation. Here are the key reasons why these tools are important:

Growing Attack Surface

Cybercriminals are increasingly targeting APIs due to their role in connecting services and transferring sensitive data. A compromised API can lead to significant data breaches, exposing Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and other sensitive information.

Complexity of Security Needs

Traditional security measures often fall short when it comes to APIs. They require specialized security frameworks that address unique vulnerabilities, such as insecure authentication and insufficient access controls. API security tools help implement these advanced security measures effectively.

Real-Time Threat Detection

Many API security tools leverage AI and machine learning to analyze traffic patterns and detect anomalies in real-time. This capability allows organizations to respond swiftly to potential threats, minimizing the impact of any security breaches.

Compliance and Regulatory Requirements

Organizations must comply with various regulations regarding data protection. API security tools facilitate compliance by ensuring that APIs adhere to necessary security standards, thereby protecting both the organization and its customers.

Secure Development Practices

API security tools integrate into the development lifecycle, allowing for early detection of vulnerabilities during the development phase. This proactive approach helps prevent developers from deploying security flaws into production environments.

Mitigation of Logic Flaws

Many breaches occur due to logic flaws within APIs rather than traditional vulnerabilities like SQL injection or XSS attacks. Specialized tools can identify these logic vulnerabilities before attackers can exploit them.

Key Criteria for Evaluating API Security Tool

When selecting API Security Tools, API security companies or API Security Vendors, application security engineers focus on several critical factors. They seek API Security tools with robust security measures, including authentication, encryption, and compliance with standards like GDPR.

Application Security engineers ensure the solution provides real-time threat detection and prevention, along with effective incident response capabilities. They check customer reviews and case studies to gauge effectiveness and consider the organization's industry reputation and awards.

Application Security engineers prefer API Security tools that integrate seamlessly with existing systems and support various environments, such as cloud, hybrid, and on-premises. They ensure the solution scales with increasing traffic and maintains performance under high loads.

Responsive and knowledgeable customer support is crucial, and security engineers look for cost-effective solutions with transparent pricing. Additionally, they favor tools that offer customization for specific needs, detailed reporting and analytics, and utilize AI/ML for enhanced threat detection.

10 Best API Security Tools

In the rapidly evolving landscape of API security, several API Security Companies or API Security Vendors stand out for their innovative solutions and comprehensive protection. Let's explore the 10 best API security vendors:

1. Akto

Akto is a security platform focused on API security. It helps organizations protect their APIs by continuously scanning for vulnerabilities, identifying misconfigurations, and providing actionable insights to improve the security posture of their API ecosystem. Akto integrates seamlessly into the CI/CD pipeline, allowing for real-time monitoring and quick remediation of potential threats.

Key Features

• Discovers all APIs within the organization’s system without manual intervention.

• Performs more than 400 pre-built security checks to uncover any vulnerabilities present.

• Provides ongoing monitoring and management of the API security status.

• Guarantees strong security for authentication and authorization.

• Easily integrates with CI/CD pipelines to enable continuous testing.

2. F5

F5 is a leading multi-cloud application services and security company, offering advanced solutions to protect APIs and web applications. It is renowned for its suite of security offerings, particularly for safeguarding applications from Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks, bot traffic, and other web-based threats. F5 helps organizations ensure the performance, availability, and security of their applications in an increasingly distributed environment.

Key Features

• F5 offers comprehensive DDoS protection that effectively mitigates large-scale attacks targeting APIs and web applications.

• Enhances API performance and security with traffic management and load balancing capabilities.

• F5 Advanced WAF provides API security, protecting against common API vulnerabilities like injection attacks and unauthorized access.

• AI-driven threat intelligence proactively detects and mitigates emerging cyber threats, ensuring continuous application protection.

3. Cloudflare

Cloudflare provides a robust API security platform that helps organizations protect their APIs from abuse and threats, ensuring smooth and secure API operations. With its integrated Web Application Firewall (WAF), DDoS protection, and bot management capabilities, Cloudflare's API Shield enables monitoring and blocking of malicious API traffic in real-time. It provides comprehensive security measures, from OAuth authentication to mTLS (Mutual TLS) encryption, ensuring that only authorized users and devices can access APIs.

Key Features

• Rate limiting to prevent abuse by setting strict thresholds for API usage.

• DDoS protection for APIs to safeguard against volumetric attacks.

• Organizations achieve compliance with industry standards such as PCI DSS and GDPR, which provide enhanced data protection and regulatory compliance.

• Machine learning-based detection to block API misuse and attacks such as injection and data exposure.

4. Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP)

The Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) developed ZAP as an open-source web security testing tool. The community maintains it to ensure it stays up-to-date and effective against the latest threats. ZAP primarily offers penetration testing through automation.

Key Features

• Tests web applications and APIs against several vulnerabilities outlined in the OWASP Top 10, and is free and open-source.

• Integrates easily with various other platforms.

• Supports Java and other languages, such as JRuby and Javascript.

5. Wallarm

Wallarm serves as a comprehensive API security platform specifically designed for modern API-first organizations. The tool delivers real-time API discovery and comprehensive threat prevention across the entire portfolio, whether in multi-cloud or cloud-native environments.

Key Features

• Offers a full suite of API security tools with seamless integration into other platforms.

• Provides analytics and dashboards for test reports.

• Integrates easily with any CI/CD workflow, enabling automatic execution of dynamic test cases.

6. SALT Security

SALT Security is a well-known API security company that uses AI to provide Continuous Delivery (CD) and real-time protection for the APIs against harmful cyber attackers. This approach offers better insights into the organization’s API security throughout its lifecycle.

Key Features

• Uses artificial intelligence to detect and respond to suspicious behavior quickly.

• Provides deeper insights into API usage and any gaps.

• Employs sophisticated pattern recognition to prevent business logic abuse.

• Delivers continuous discovery and assessment of API risks.

7. Imperva Security

Imperva stands out among the API security solutions available on the market. The platform provides a range of features and comprehensive protection for APIs, including DDoS protection, bot mitigation, and API web traffic analysis.

Key Features

• Delivers advanced bot security to protect against automated cyber-attacks.

• Conducts in-depth API web traffic analysis to identify and prevent various security threats.

• Ensures robust DDoS protection to maintain API availability during high-traffic periods.

8. IBM API Connect

IBM's API Connect is a comprehensive API management and security platform. The tool provides a comprehensive API gateway, a robust developer portal, and analytics while focusing on security. Additionally, IBM's extensive history in enterprise solutions makes this tool a preferred choice for organizations.

Key Features

• Delivers a comprehensive API management platform with built-in security features.

• Provides analytics to monitor API traffic and identify potential threats.

• Supports OAuth for secure authentication and authorization.

9. StackHawk

StackHawk is a trusted API security tool that lets security teams find, fix, and prevent various security vulnerabilities in the APIs with ease. The tool's key highlight is its easy integration into the development pipeline, making it an excellent option for DevOps teams.

Key Features

• Empower developers to identify and address urgent security concerns during the development lifecycle.

• Supports a wide variety of programming languages and frameworks.

• Integrates easily into Continuous Integration (CI) and Continuous Deployment (CD) workflows to detect and resolve issues.

10. Cequence

Cequence Security offers a unified API security platform that provides protection across the entire API lifecycle. It specializes in detecting and mitigating API threats such as data leaks, API abuse, and automated attacks. Cequence focuses on both API visibility and protection, ensuring organizations have a clear view of their API ecosystem and the API Security tools necessary to defend against complex threats.

Key Features

• Provides full visibility into known and unknown (shadow) APIs to detect and mitigate risks.

• Offers API threat protection by analyzing real-time traffic and blocking suspicious activities.

• Helps maintain security policies in line with compliance requirements like PCI DSS, GDPR, and HIPAA.

Final Thoughts

To safeguard the digital assets and maintain the integrity of the applications, application security engineers must invest in robust API security solutions. The rise in API usage has expanded the attack surface, making it imperative to adopt comprehensive security measures. By leveraging advanced tools from leading API security companies, organizations can effectively detect and mitigate threats, ensuring the protection of sensitive data and seamless operation of the services.

Among the top API security solutions, Akto stands out with its extensive capabilities. Akto offers over 100 built-in tests and seamless integration with platforms like AWS . It excels in API discovery, automated testing, and identifying critical vulnerabilities. Akto's user-friendly interface and strong security measures make it an excellent choice for organizations looking to enhance their API security and stay ahead of potential threats.

To explore Akto further, book a demo today.