Prerequisites for use

Understanding the following content can help users better use the API operation services:

• API authentication mechanism
• Typesetting conventions

API authentication mechanism

Users can interact with Baidu AI Cloud in two ways: authenticated mode and anonymous mode. In authenticated mode, the identity of the sender must be verified using encryption with the Access Key ID/Secret Access Key. The Access Key ID (AK) identifies the user, while the Secret Access Key (SK) is used both to encrypt the authentication string by the user and to verify the authentication string by Baidu AI Cloud. The SK must remain confidential and is known only to the user and Baidu AI Cloud.

When Baidu AI Cloud receives a user's request, the system will use the same SK and identical certification mechanism to generate a certification string, and then compare it with the certification string included in the user's request. If the authentication strings are the same, the system considers that the user possess the specified operation permission and proceeds with the relevant executions. If the authentication strings differ, the system will skip this operation and returns an error code. For detailed information on the authentication mechanism, please refer to [Authentication](Reference/Authentication mechanism/Introduction.md)

Typesetting conventions