Cookbooks
Python
Chapter 11. HTML and the Web
Sending an HTTP request with basic authentication

Python:
Sending an HTTP request with basic authentication

How to:

Here’s how you get Python to chat with a server using Basic Auth.

import requests
from requests.auth import HTTPBasicAuth

# Replace with your actual credentials and the API endpoint you're hitting
username = 'cooluser'
password = 'supersecretpassword'
url = 'https://api.someservice.com/data'

response = requests.get(url, auth=HTTPBasicAuth(username, password))

# Check out what we got back
print(response.status_code)
print(response.json())  # assuming the response is in JSON format

Output might look like this if things went smooth:

200
{'data': 'Your secret stuff!'}

But if you goofed up the creds:

401

That’s a no-entry sign right there.

Deep Dive

Historically, HTTP Basic Auth is as old-school as it gets for web security, a simple way to do the secret handshake with a website. It’s not very secure on its own because it sends credentials in plain text, just base64 encoded – not encrypted. Always use HTTPS to keep the credentials from being as easy to snag as candy from a baby.

There are more secure alternatives, like Digest Access Authentication where the password is never sent plain over the network. OAuth is another big one, especially for APIs today. It’s more like issuing a temporary VIP pass than showing ID every time.

Under the hood, the requests library is encoding your username and password and slapping them into an Authorization header formatted like Basic base64encodedcredentials. The server decodes this header, checks your creds, and if you’re legit, gives you access.

See Also

Sending an HTTP request