Factors That Influence The API Key Length

• Palo Alto Firewalls
• PAN-OS 9.0 and above
• API Key

1. On PAN-OS platforms for making API calls, an API key must be generated, in order to make authenticated API calls. 
2. In most situations, an API key is of length 132 characters. However, there are certain instances wherein this can vary and an even longer key of length 164 characters is generated.
3. The user input for generating the API key is primarily the username and password of the device.
4. This username/password is used to generate the API key and hence depending on how many characters the username and password (in total) contains the API key length can vary.
5. The API key of length 132 characters is achieved only if the total number of characters in the username and password combination is below 26 characters.
6. If the character count on the username and password combination is 27 or above the resulting API key length will be 164 characters.
7. Examples are provided in the additional information section.
   
   

 How to get the API key:

Case 1: Username and Password is "api" and "password". Total character count is (api+password) = 11.

#curl -k -X GET 'https://<ip_address>/api/?type=keygen&user=api&password=password'

<response status = 'success'>
    <result>
        <key>
            LUFRPT1qQlFPKzMwcWloSXRjT2dMQ2p1T2k5VVR0cmc9QXIvT3BhL3gxUWVYS1VMWmNNc29oY2d4VmhrVEgzU2FMbnZ0ZlhBWDBQZ0R5bDlheHNDUjZqTHVkQW1IYnpaZA==
        </key>
    </result>
</response>

The resulting API key length is 132 characters.

Case 2: Username and Password is "api" and "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvw". Total character count is 26.
 

#curl -k -X GET 'https://<ip_address>/api/?type=keygen&user=api&password=abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvw'

<response status = 'success'>
    <result>
        <key>
            LUFRPT1xWHJlTzI3bWtVYURsSmJ4N3Z3d0grY3ZsYTg9WGIzSEZqQ0JxeXVsVmxKWUhSMTNkSDlHSW41dG5YWnlnaHVNYXZyOFVKWGNkWjZ0U0xwMTJsL2RzT20wMGRXbQ==
        </key>
    </result>
</response>

The resulting API key length is 132 characters.

Case 3: Username and Password is "api" and "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwx". Total character count is 27.
 

#curl -k -X GET 'https://<ip_address>/api/?type=keygen&user=api&password=abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwx'

<response status = 'success'>
    <result>
        <key>
            LUFRPT15RDVCTm5uc3U2V0s0TFMzMlQ5SExWeFNnWHM9WGIzSEZqQ0JxeXVsVmxKWUhSMTNkQUJwd3QrcjB3RVl0QW9NS0puVkQ2eG1WMnl5RDZzbDZSbVBoQk9td2F0SmxmdXhOWXo2ekZqYmZiMEVjUHJReUE9PQ==
        </key>
    </result>
</response>

The resulting API key length is 164 characters.

Case 4: Username and Password is "apiuser" and "abcdefghijklmnopqrs". The total character count is 26.
 

#curl -k -X GET 'https://<ip_addresss>/api/?type=keygen&user=apiuser&password=abcdefghijklmnopqrs'

<response status = 'success'>
    <result>
        <key>
            LUFRPT1aalI0MW56NXBaQi9UcjBuS3MrY3ZNYkxrOXc9ZmdxYUNmR3hFQUFwb0VIRE1sLytsYStRSDYzeGxMZWhDQzJjTEFWN2NZN3hib1FWb0JMc1FVS0FqelBCV2FPeg==
        </key>
    </result>
</response>

The resulting API key length is 132 characters.

Case 5: Username and Password is "apiuser" and "abcdefghijklmnopqrst". The total character count is 27.
 

#curl -k -X GET 'https://<ip_address>/api/?type=keygen&user=apiuser&password=abcdefghijklmnopqrst'

<response status = 'success'>
    <result>
        <key>
            LUFRPT1HbEk4dzNsWUYxc1lzSEQ4TlRrdjZYMmtYekk9ZmdxYUNmR3hFQUFwb0VIRE1sLytsVC9OQm9GaDlpS0p3QWdaVWw5Tk94T1pWRndxQUVWbTFVVlZwOHJRMDZsbmtrWEo3NWsxajcrcUF1bnNXRVFSMmc9PQ==
        </key>
    </result>
</response>

The resulting API key length is 164 characters.