Authentication

Note: You need authentication to use the hosted API. If you're running the yente application on-premises, you can disregard this page.

To use the OpenSanctions API, you need an API key to identify yourself. Please visit the API product page or contact us to learn more. OpenSanctions will issue free API keys to non-commercial users and those working in media companies.

Once you have obtained an API key, you must include it with each request sent to the service. The key can be provided either in the Authorization HTTP header, or using the ?api_key= query parameter.

For the header option, please include the key into your request like this:

Authorization: ApiKey xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

When using the query parameter, you can simply append it to the request URL:

https://api.opensanctions.org/search/default?q=test&api_key=xxxxxxxxxx

Note: Your API key should be kept secret - keep it safe to prevent unauthorised use of your OpenSanctions account.

Python example

Here's a code snippet that demonstrates how you can include the API key in each request when using the Python requests library:

import os
import requests

API_URL = "https://api.opensanctions.org"
# Read an environment variable to get the API key:
API_KEY = os.environ.get("OPENSANCTIONS_API_KEY")

session = requests.Session()
session.headers['Authorization'] = f"ApiKey {API_KEY}"

# Fetch an entity:
response = session.get(f"{API_URL}/entities/Q7747")
response.raise_for_status()
entity_data = response.json()

# Run a match query:
query = {"schema": "Person", "properties": {"name": ["Vladimir Putin"]}}
request = {"queries": {"query": query}}
response = session.post(f"{API_URL}/match/default", json=request)
response.raise_for_status()
results = response.json().get("responses").get("query").get("results")