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GraphQL: Where Batching Meets Broken Authorization

6 min read DarkLayer Security Research

GraphQL changes the economics of an authorization bug. In a REST API, a missing object-level check is typically one endpoint and one identifier. In GraphQL, the same missing check in a resolver can be reached repeatedly within a single request using aliases — turning an individual oversight into a bulk data exposure.

Introspection availability is often discussed first, but it is the smaller question. The more consequential one is whether every resolver enforces object-level authorization independently, rather than trusting that the caller already had access to a parent object.

Batching introduces a second dimension: request-level rate limits and cost analysis that count one HTTP request may miss dozens of underlying operations.

When we assess GraphQL surfaces, we map resolvers against the authorization matrix first, then probe how far a single token can reach through aliases, nested selections and batching — because that is the shape an attacker will use.

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