Preventing external automation interference with my knack database records

Hi everyone, I’m currently building a tracking system for a gaming community using Knack, and I’ve run into a bit of a challenge regarding data validation. I’ve noticed that some of our more tech-savvy users are trying to use various scripts in tools to automate their activity logs, which is starting to mess with our database records and causing some major inconsistencies.

My concern is that these external script executors might be finding a way to bypass my front-end form validation by hitting the API directly. I’m seeing duplicate entries and values that shouldn’t be possible given the constraints I set up in the Knack builder. Has anyone else dealt with users trying to inject data using third-party scripts or automation tools?

I’m trying to figure out if there is a way to enforce stricter server-side validation within Knack to block any entry that doesn’t originate from the official app interface. I’m also worried about the potential for these automated scripts to cause a spike in my API usage limits, which could get my account throttled. If you have any tips on hardening a Knack app against this kind of external automation or if you’ve found a way to flag “unnatural” data entry patterns, I would really appreciate the help.

Hi @amandaisaac2812, that’s a very good question, and unfortunately I don’t think there is a way to prevent users from performing their own API requests.
I know the team is exploring row-level permissions for user roles, so I have raised a feature request here to incorporate API permissions, if you’d like to vote for it.

1 Like