API Reference

The StrongDM API allows users of StrongDM to programmatically interact with their organization in StrongDM in order to create, remove, or manage users, roles, permissions, gateways, relays, resources, and more. The amount of API access afforded to an API key depends entirely on what was granted to the key by the organization’s administrators when the key was created.

The StrongDM API is constructed with gRPC and a request signature model that requires the use of one of the StrongDM SDKs to interface with the API. The SDKs were designed with REST principles in mind. They are built around a set of domain objects, as well as the basic set of REST verbs: Create, Read, Update, and Delete.

Moreover, the StrongDM API provides advanced auditing and logging capabilities that simplify how data is extracted from StrongDM for programmatic integration into other parts of your organization, such as SIEM, log aggregators, compliance and/or security reports, or end-to-end IAM workflows. You can additionally use the StrongDM API to do the following:

• Get the history of what happened in your organization.
• View full snapshots.
• Look at shells for all replays.
• View SSH session data as it comes in, and watch sessions play live.
• Actively look at queries as they come in.
• Suspend users by ID.

The destination for requests directly to the StrongDM API is api.strongdm.com.

You can interact with the API via any of StrongDM’s SDKs or Terraform.

StrongDM SDKs #

The StrongDM API allows for the programmatic management of StrongDM features as well as the resources attached to the organization. StrongDM supports the following SDK options: Go, Java, Python, and Ruby.

Feel free to use the SDKs to interact with StrongDM from your own software, and contact support@strongdm.com if you have any questions or concerns.

StrongDM Terraform Provider #

StrongDM’s Terraform provider makes use of the StrongDM API and has a set of Terraform provider examples.

How It Works #

The StrongDM API does not rely on bearer tokens alone to protect your requests (and thus your infrastructure). Instead, the StrongDM API requires the use of request signatures modeled on the AWS V4 signing process. This methodology never sends a secret key over the network. If the key isn’t sent, the key cannot be intercepted. Furthermore, this methodology allows StrongDM to validate the time and payload of each API call, protecting against replay attacks or Manipulator in the Middle (MitM) message tampering. The StrongDM SDKs handle the gRPC calls and signing process to ensure a consistent and convenient experience.

Authentication #

Each SDK provides a client that must be constructed with an API ID and Secret (also referred to as your API key). This key also sets the client’s permission to manage objects within StrongDM. For instructions on creating your API key, see the API Keys page.

For example, in Python:

def main():
    client = strongdm.Client(<YOUR-ID>,<YOUR-SECRET>)

Domain objects #

Domain objects are present in all of the StrongDM SDKs. These domain objects are, in a way, the glossary of the API. Once you’re familiar with them, you’ll better understand what you can do with the API.

Requests #

Each domain object is accessible via functions or methods provided by the client.

For example, in Ruby:

users = client.accounts.list("")

Filters #

Many domain objects provide a common filtering language. You can use filters to narrow results from most Read operations when making requests.

For example, in Go:

users, err := client.Accounts().List(ctx, "firstName:Alice")
if err != nil {
  log.Fatal("failed to query accounts:", err)
}

In the Go example shown, only users matching the first name “Alice” are returned.

Paginate results #

When making a request with a Read operation that returns many results, the SDK automatically paginates the results. Depending on the language, pagination may be modeled as a transparent iterator, as in Ruby:

users.each do |user|
    p user
end

Alternatively, pagination may be modeled as an explicit call to receive the next result, as in Go:

for users.Next() {
    user := users.Value()
    fmt.Println(user)
}

Audit API #

History #

History domain objects (such as AccountsHistory) offer a time range to show the history of what was changed over time. For example, Accounts provides information about users and service accounts, whereas AccountsHistory provides a historical record of all the changes that have been made to the state of those accounts.

If the Advanced Insights reporting and auditing bundle is enabled for your organization, you can query the domain objects and get history for the last 13 months. If Advanced Insights is not enabled, you can query back 30 days by default and results may be truncated to 20 rows returned.

Snapshots #

Typical calls to the API return the state of a domain object at the time of the request. Snapshots, however, allow you to view the state of one or more domain objects at a specified time in the past. Snapshots let you programmatically extract the history of what happened in your organization at a certain time regarding access grants, gateways and relays, roles, resources, and so forth.

Let’s say, for example, that within the last hour there was a security incident related to a role granting access to all Redis resources. You can use a snapshot to see the state of the role an hour ago. In the following example, the desired time is specified in client.SnapshotAt(<TIME>).

For example, in Go:

client.SnapshotAt(time.Now().Add(-1*time.Hour)).Roles().Get(ctx, "r-123456")

Snapshots are supported for the following domain objects:

• AccountAttachments
• AccountGrants
• AccountPermissions
• Accounts
• Nodes
• RemoteIdentities
• RemoteIdentityGroups
• Resources
• RoleResources
• Roles
• SecretStores

If the Advanced Insights reporting and auditing bundle is enabled for your organization, you can use snapshots for any time in the last 13 months. If Advanced Insights is not enabled, you can use snapshots for the last 30 days by default and results may be truncated to 20 rows returned.

Rate Limits #

Requests are subject to rate limits. Default rate limits are generous, and you’re unlikely to reach rate limits during normal operations. If you do, however, encounter a rate limit for a valid use case, please notify support@strongdm.com to have your rate limit increased.

The following Python snippet illustrates the expected behavior for a rate-limited call. Note the remaining attribute on the returned RateLimitError, which quantifies the remaining call budget for this time period (in this case, 0):

try:
    self.client.roles.get(role.id)
except sdm.errors.RateLimitError as ex:
    self.assertEqual(ex.rate_limit.limit, 1)
    self.assertEqual(ex.rate_limit.remaining, 0)

Additional Information #

You can find resources and information about the following StrongDM topics in this section:

• Generate API Keys
• StrongDM Binary Verification
• SCIM API Spec