mcpbeat

API Security Hardening

secondsky/api-security-hardening

REST API security hardening with authentication, rate limiting, input validation, security headers. Use for production APIs, security audits, defense-in-depth, or encountering vulnerabilities, injection attacks, CORS issues.

2k tokens
context cost
the whole folder, loaded on every use
2
files
instructions only
0
copies elsewhere
how many repositories repackaged it
202
stars on the repo
on the repository, not the skill itself

Install

one command, takes just this skill from the repository
npx skills add https://github.com/secondsky/claude-skills --skill api-security-hardening

The instruction itself

7 sections, as written by the author

API Security Hardening

Protect REST APIs against common vulnerabilities with multiple security layers.

Security Middleware Stack (Express)

const helmet = require('helmet');
const rateLimit = require('express-rate-limit');
const mongoSanitize = require('express-mongo-sanitize');

app.use(helmet());
app.use(mongoSanitize());
// For input sanitization, see the `xss-prevention` skill — do NOT use the
// deprecated `xss-clean` package (unmaintained since 2018; its own README
// recommends migrating off it).

app.use('/api/', rateLimit({
  windowMs: 15 * 60 * 1000,
  max: 100
}));

app.use('/api/auth/', rateLimit({
  windowMs: 15 * 60 * 1000,
  max: 5
}));

Input Validation

const { body, validationResult } = require('express-validator');
const escapeHtml = require('escape-html');

app.post('/users',
  body('email').isEmail().normalizeEmail(),
  body('password').isLength({ min: 8 }).matches(/[A-Z]/).matches(/[0-9]/),
  // express-validator v7+ removed the built-in .escape() sanitizer; use a
  // customSanitizer backed by `escape-html` to HTML-escape the value.
  body('name').trim().isLength({ max: 100 }).customSanitizer(v => escapeHtml(v)),
  (req, res) => {
    const errors = validationResult(req);
    if (!errors.isEmpty()) {
      return res.status(400).json({ errors: errors.array() });
    }
    // Process request
  }
);

Security Headers

app.use((req, res, next) => {
  res.setHeader('Content-Security-Policy', "default-src 'self'");
  res.setHeader('X-Frame-Options', 'DENY');
  res.setHeader('X-Content-Type-Options', 'nosniff');
  res.setHeader('Strict-Transport-Security', 'max-age=31536000; includeSubDomains');
  res.setHeader('X-XSS-Protection', '1; mode=block');
  next();
});

Security Checklist

  • [ ] HTTPS everywhere
  • [ ] Authentication on all protected routes
  • [ ] Input validation and sanitization
  • [ ] Rate limiting enabled
  • [ ] Security headers configured
  • [ ] CORS restricted to allowed origins
  • [ ] No stack traces in production errors
  • [ ] Audit logging enabled
  • [ ] Dependencies regularly updated

Additional Implementations

See references/python-nginx.md for:

  • Python FastAPI security middleware
  • Pydantic input validation with password rules
  • Nginx SSL/TLS and security headers configuration
  • HTTP Parameter Pollution prevention

Never Do

  • Trust user input without validation
  • Return detailed errors in production
  • Store secrets in code
  • Use GET for state-changing operations
  • Disable security for convenience

How to use it

Copy the folder

Take secondsky/api-security-hardening from the repository into ~/.claude/skills for personal use, or into .claude/skills inside a project.

Check the name does not clash

The agent identifies a skill by the name field in its header. Two skills with the same name cannot sit side by side — one of them will be ignored.