PingOne

Troubleshooting API Access Management

The following resources can help you solve issues with API Access Management.

Solutions

API client HTTP 5xx errors

Likely cause

The API gateway might return HTTP 502 when there is misconfiguration or miscommunication between the Ping Identity gateway integration kit and the HTTP Access Policy Service in PingOne Authorize.

How to troubleshoot

The gateway integration kit logs warning messages to the API gateway error log when it encounters problems communicating with PingOne Authorize. For more information, see the integration kit documentation for your API gateway: Troubleshooting Kong Gateway integration with PingOne Authorize

API client HTTP 404 errors

Likely cause

The API gateway might return HTTP 404 to API clients when PingOne cannot match an API client’s request to any of the Base URLs configured for an API service.

How to troubleshoot

PingOne Authorize produces events in your PingOne environment audit log to aid in troubleshooting HTTP 4xx errors. For more information, see Viewing API Access Management events in your PingOne environment audit log.

Details

The PingOne environment audit log will provide more detailed information. For example: No API server defines policy for the URL. The error message lists the URL sent by the API client to the API gateway. For example: https://localhost:8443/meme-game/api/v1/users/user.0/answers.

How to fix

Go to Authorization > API Services. Check the Base URL settings for the API service in question. If necessary, create an API service. Ensure that the Base URL for the API service matches the beginning of the URLs used by API clients when making requests for the API service through the API gateway.

API client HTTP 401 errors

Likely causes

The API gateway returns HTTP 401 to API clients when the API client’s request cannot be authenticated or doesn’t satisfy basic access control checks for an API service. For example, the API client attempts to invoke APIs in API service A using an OAuth Access Token issued for API service B. Or, the API client is using an old OAuth Access Token that has since expired.

How to troubleshoot

PingOne Authorize produces events in your PingOne Environment Audit Log to aid in troubleshooting HTTP 4xx errors. For more information, see Viewing API Access Management events in your PingOne environment audit log.

Details

The PingOne Environment Audit Log provides more detailed information. For example:

Request to the URL "https://example.com" denied due to an invalid OAuth access token.

The www-authenticate HTTP response header contains more information, such as Token expired or Invalid audience.

How to fix

Ensure that API clients properly manage their OAuth Access Tokens, including refreshing them or obtaining new tokens as necessary before tokens expire.

Other API client HTTP 4xx errors

Likely causes

The API gateway returns other HTTP 4xx errors to API clients when the API client’s request doesn’t satisfy access control rules configured for the API service or its API Operations in PingOne Authorize. For example, the API client attempts to invoke an API Operation that requires the user to be a member of a particular group in PingOne, but the user is not a member of that group.

How to troubleshoot

PingOne Authorize produces events in your PingOne Environment Audit Log in order to aid in troubleshooting HTTP 4xx errors. For more information, see Viewing API Access Management events in your PingOne environment audit log. You can trace recent authorization decisions in order to understand which access rules were not satisfied. For more information, see Viewing recent decisions for the API Access Management decision endpoint.

Details

The PingOne Environment Audit Log provides more detailed information. For example:

Request to the URL "https://example.com" denied by policy evaluation."

The Recent Decisions visualization contains more information, including which rule was not satisfied and which attribute values were compared during policy evaluation. For more information, see Examining recent decisions.

How to fix

Ensure that API Operation access rules are properly configured to meet your application requirements. For group-based access control, ensure that the user is a member of one of the required groups. Also, ensure that the API client has been delegated authorization by a user, such as obtaining an OAuth Access Token using OAuth Code Flow.

Viewing API Access Management events in your PingOne environment audit log

Review audit activities in PingOne to verify that the API Access Management service is working properly or to troubleshoot any configuration problems.

About this task

When you make API requests to test configuration of API gateways, API Services, and resource operations, you can review runtime activity logs to ensure components are working correctly and to diagnose configuration problems. You can also check HTTP Access Policy management logs to review the status of actions performed on API Services.

Steps

  1. In PingOne, go to Monitoring > Audit.

  2. Run an audit report to show HTTP Access Policy events:

    1. For Filter Type, select Event Type.

    2. For Filter, select the following options:

      • HTTP Request Policy Evaluated

      • HTTP Response Policy Evaluated

    3. Click Run.

  3. In the Activities table, in the Details column, click View to examine details for HTTP Access Policy events.

    Parameter Description

    API server resources

    The API server name and ID. Also the name and a link to the matched API operation.

    This information is contained in the resources field.

    Gateway resources

    The name and ID of the gateway that authenticated to the API, your environment ID, and a link to the gateway in the management API.

    This information is contained in the actors.client field.

    Result

    The status is either SUCCESS or FAILED. The description provides an explanation for the success or failure.

    Policy evaluation result

    Evaluation result codes and messages:

    • POLICY_EVALUATION_SUCCEEDED: The request was evaluated successfully to produce a permit or deny decision. The message further explains the decision.

    • POLICY_EVALUATION_FAILED: The request failed because of a policy evaluation error.

    • INVALID_GATEWAY_REQUEST: The authorization plugin sent an invalid request to PingOne.

    • NO_POLICY_FOUND: No matching API server was found to define the policy for the operation.

    • UNEXPECTED_ERROR: An error occurred that doesn’t fall under one of the other result codes.

    The HTTP response status code is also provided.

    Authorization decision

    The decision returned by the decision service for HTTP request events:

    • PERMIT

    • DENY

    • NOT_APPLICABLE

    • INDETERMINATE

  4. Run another audit report to show API Service events:

    1. For Filter Type, select Event Type.

    2. For Filter, select the following options:

      • API Service Created

      • API Service Deleted

      • API Service Deployed

      • API Service Updated

    3. Click Run.

  5. In the Activities table, in the Details column, click View to examine details for API Service events.

    Parameter Description

    Actors

    The client that performed the action. Also, the environment ID, the name and ID of the signed-on user, and a link to the user in the management API.

    Action

    The type of action performed and a brief description.

    Resources

    The type, ID, and name of the API Service. Also, the environment ID and a link to the API Service in the management API.

    Result

    The status is either SUCCESS or FAILED. The description provides an explanation for the success or failure.

Viewing recent decisions for the API Access Management decision endpoint

Trace recent authorization decisions to help troubleshoot problems with API Access Management rules and policies.

To help with troubleshooting, examine recent decisions for the decision endpoint associated with your API service. For more information, see Examining recent decisions.