API Bearer Auth vs REST XML-RPC Data Checker

The API Bearer Auth plugin enables authentication for the REST API by using JWT access an refresh tokens. After the user logs in, the access and refresh tokens are returned and can be used for the next requests. Issued tokens can be revoked from within the users admin screen. See below for the endpoints. Note that after activating this plugin, all REST API endpoints will need to be authenticated, unless the endpoint is whitelisted in the api_bearer_auth_unauthenticated_urls filter (see FAQ for how to use this filter). JWT Access tokens can be formatted as JWT tokens. For this to work, you first have to create a secret and add it to the wp-config.php file. If you don’t do this, access tokens will work also, but are just random strings. To create a random secret key, you can do for example: base64_encode(openssl_random_pseudo_bytes(64)); And then add the result to wp-config: define('API_BEARER_JWT_SECRET', 'mysecretkey'); If you have problems, you can verify your JWT tokens at: https://jwt.io/ Revoke tokens This plugin adds a column to the users table in de admin where you can see when a token expires. You can also revoke tokens by selection the “Revoke API tokens” from the bulk actions select box. API endpoints Note that all endpoints expect JSON in the POST body. Login Endpoint: POST /api-bearer-auth/v1/login Request body: Note: client_name is optional. But if you use it, make sure to use it as well for the refresh call! {"username": "my_username", "password": "my_password", "client_name": "my_app"} Response: { "wp_user": { "data": { "ID": 1, "user_login": "your_user_login", // other default WordPress user fields } }, "access_token": "your_access_token", "expires_in": 86400, // number of seconds "refresh_token": "your_refresh_token" } Make sure to save the access and refresh token! Refresh access token Endpoint: POST /api-bearer-auth/v1/tokens/refresh Request body: Note: client_name is optional. But if you did use it for the login call, make sure to use it here as well! {"token": "your_refresh_token", "client_name": "my_app"} Response success: { "access_token": "your_new_access_token", "expires_in": 86400 } Response when sending a wrong refresh token is a 401: { "code": "api_api_bearer_auth_error_invalid_token", "message": "Invalid token.", "data": { "status": 401 } } Do a request After you have the access token, you can make requests to authenticated endpoints with an Authorization header like this: Authorization: Bearer Note that Apache sometimes strips out the Authorization header. If this is the case, make sure to add this to the .htaccess file: RewriteCond %{HTTP:Authorization} ^(.*) # Don't know why, but some need the line below instead of the RewriteRule line # SetEnvIf Authorization .+ HTTP_AUTHORIZATION=$0 RewriteRule ^(.*) - [E=HTTP_AUTHORIZATION:%1] If you are not logged in or you send an invalid access token, you get a 401 response: { "code": "api_bearer_auth_not_logged_in", "message": "You are not logged in.", "data": { "status": 401 } } Important update Update immediately if you’re using a version below 20200807. Before this version all access tokens were updated when calling the refresh callback. If you are affected by this the fastest solution is to execute this query: update wp_user_tokens set access_token_valid = NOW(); This will invalidate all access tokens. This means that all users need to refresh their access token and will get a new access token and a unique one this time. A big thank to @harchvertelol for reporting this and suggesting the fix as well!

JSON REST API and XML-RPC API are powerful ways to remotely interact with WordPress. If you don’t have external applications that need to communicate with your WordPress instance using JSON REST API or XML-RPC API you should disable access to them for external requests. In the standard WordPress installation JSON REST API and XML-RPC API are enabled by default. In particular the REST API is turned on also for unlogged users. This means that your WordPress instance is potentially leaking data, for example anyone could be able to: copy easily your published contents natively with the REST API (and not with a web crawler); get the list of all users (with their ID, nickname and name); retrieve other information that you didn’t want to be public (such as an unlisted published page or a saved media not yet used). Even if you could do the stuff by writing your own code using native filters, this plugin aims to help you to control JSON REST API and XML-RPC API accesses from the administration panel or programmatically by a simple API filter. Basic Features Disable REST API interface for unlogged users. Disable JSONP support on REST API. Add Basic Authentication to REST API. Remove REST tags, REST Link HTTP header and REST Really Simple Discovery (RSD) informations. Setup trusted users, IP/Networks and endpoints for unlogged users REST requests. Change REST endpoint prefix. Disable XML-RPC API interface. Remove to the Really Simple Discovery (RDS) informations. Remove X-Pingback HTTP header. Setup trusted users, IP/Networks and methods for XML-RPC requests. Show user’s access informations in users list administration screen. Usage Once the plugin is installed you can control settings in the following ways: Using the Settings->REST XML-RPC Data Checker administration screen. Programmatically, by using rest_xmlrpc_data_checker_settings filter (see below). API Hooks rest_xmlrpc_data_checker_settings Filters plugin settings values. apply_filters( 'rest_xmlrpc_data_checker_settings', array $settings ) rest_xmlrpc_data_checker_admin_settings Filter allowing to display or not the plugin settings page in the administration. apply_filters( 'rest_xmlrpc_data_checker_admin_settings', boolean $display ) rest_xmlrpc_data_checker_rest_error Filter JSON REST authentication error after plugin checks. apply_filters( 'rest_xmlrpc_data_checker_rest_error', WP_Error|boolean $result ) xmlrpc_before_insert_post Filter XML-RPC post data to be inserted via XML-RPC before to insert post into database. apply_filters( 'xmlrpc_before_insert_post', array|IXR_Error $content_struct, WP_User $user )