Securing GraphQL at Scale with Zero Trust APIs

Modern microservice architectures often decentralize authentication and authorization, leading to inconsistent security policies and increased attack surfaces. GraphQL, while powerful, introduces unique risks such as over-fetching, query batching abuse, and introspection-based attacks that many teams underestimate.

In this talk, I present a real-world case study of building a secure, identity-aware GraphQL gateway that enforces Zero Trust principles across distributed services. By integrating centralized identity management with Keycloak and leveraging service mesh technologies like Istio and Envoy, we created a unified layer for authentication, authorization, and traffic governance.

The session will walk through practical challenges, including enforcing fine-grained access control, implementing query cost analysis, and mitigating abuse patterns in production. Attendees will gain insights into designing secure GraphQL APIs that scale without compromising performance or developer experience.

This talk matters because API security is no longer optional. As organizations increasingly adopt GraphQL, understanding how to secure it in real-world systems is critical to preventing data leaks and maintaining trust.