performing-api-rate-limiting-bypass

What problem does it solve?

Identifies and validates weaknesses in API rate limiting and throttling controls that attackers can exploit to perform brute force, credential stuffing, or denial-of-service attacks by bypassing enforcement mechanisms.

Core Features & Use Cases

• Header Spoofing Tests: Rotate and inject common proxy headers (X-Forwarded-For, X-Real-IP, CF-Connecting-IP, Forwarded) to check if rate limits rely on client-supplied values.
• Path, Method & Encoding Variations: Probe endpoint normalization, method-specific limits, and encoding tricks (null bytes, trailing slashes, case changes) to discover inconsistent enforcement.
• Distributed & Account Rotation: Simulate concurrent and distributed request patterns and identifier rotations to evaluate per-IP vs per-account protections.
• Use Case: Security testers can run a targeted assessment against authentication and sensitive endpoints to produce findings and remediation guidance for OWASP API4:2023 Unrestricted Resource Consumption.

Quick Start

Run the included agent against the target API endpoint with written authorization and enable header, method, and path tests to discover bypasses.