API testing that runs inside the authorization boundary
Federal, state, and local government workloads share three constraints: deployment must clear an authorization boundary (often air-gapped), procurement favors vendor-independent tooling, and cross-agency integrations are SOAP-heavy. Shift-Left API was designed for that posture.
What blocks government agencies from adopting modern API testing
The decision rarely turns on features. It turns on whether the tool clears the authorization boundary, the AI-use policy, and the supply-chain review without exception requests.
Air-gapped deployments supported
Federal classified workloads, DoD impact-level environments, and sovereign-cloud regions cannot make outbound calls to a vendor SaaS, let alone to a third-party LLM API. Shift-Left API runs self-hosted on infrastructure your agency controls, including air-gapped networks where the model itself is local (Ollama, vLLM, LM Studio, on Trial and Enterprise). Telemetry is off by default. Licence validation and updates contact Total Shift Left unless offline licensing is arranged with us.
Procurement favors vendor-independent tooling
Government procurement increasingly weights tools that do not lock the agency into a single SaaS vendor for telemetry, AI inference, or test artifacts. Self-hosted test definitions and run history, exportable reports, and bring-your-own-LLM keep the agency in control of every dependency.
Cross-agency integration buses are SOAP-heavy
NIEM-conformant data exchanges, federal financial system integrations, and most cross-agency service buses still rely on SOAP/WSDL contracts. Modern testing tools that deprecated SOAP support are a non-starter for the realistic government integration surface.
Reference architecture, shared upfront
Long-tail support and architecture documentation are evaluation criteria, not afterthoughts. Reference deployment topology, security questionnaire response, and supply-chain (SBOM) summary are shared on the architect call so the security review can run in parallel with the technical evaluation.
Control evidence mapping
How API test artifacts and run evidence map to the frameworks government auditors and authorizing officials actually ask about.
| Framework / authorization | How API test evidence applies |
|---|---|
| FedRAMP Moderate / High (NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5) | Self-hosted in your authorization boundary; CM-3 / CM-4 change control evidence via per-release test run reports; AU-2 audit log capture, readable page by page through the API. |
| StateRAMP | Same self-hosted posture; documented evidence retention per release for state authorization packages. |
| DoD IL4 / IL5 | Air-gapped deployment with a local LLM inside the boundary, so no model-API call leaves it; licence validation and updates contact Total Shift Left, so ask us about offline licensing. |
| CMMC 2.0 (defense industrial base) | Test changes recorded in a role-scoped audit trail; AES-256 credential storage at rest. |
| FISMA / NIST CSF | Documented, repeatable validation of API changes pre-release; per-project role assignments; exportable evidence. |
| CJIS Security Policy (law-enforcement integrations) | Self-hosted deployment with a local LLM, so test data is not sent to a third-party AI service; credentials are redacted from captured headers. |
| NIST SP 800-53 RA-5 / SA-11 and NIST SSDF | With the API security testing add-on: OWASP, ASVS and CWE-mapped checks generated beside your functional tests, SARIF output for the CI gate and a NIST SSDF compliance view. CA-8 still calls for a penetration test. |
This is positioning evidence, not an authorization. Talk to your authorizing official for binding control-coverage decisions. Control-by-control detail is in API Testing FedRAMP Controls. Security-testing evidence comes from the API security testing add-on, a paid add-on to Professional, Custom and Enterprise licences that is included in the trial.
Integration surface we're built to test
NIEM-conformant cross-agency data exchanges
XML response assertions (SOAP fault, envelope and XPath-style element checks); contract-drift detection between releases.
Federal financial system integrations (Treasury, IPP, G-Invoicing)
SOAP/WSDL contract testing with per-environment endpoint and credential profiles.
State Medicaid / SNAP / unemployment integration buses
Mixed REST + SOAP; credentials redacted from captured headers; synthetic test data fixtures generated in-boundary.
Identity-proofing & login.gov / state-equivalent IdPs
OAuth 2.0 (five grant types incl. PKCE and device code), mTLS and JWT Bearer auth profiles, with negative-path tests.
Defense / classified workloads
Air-gapped deployment with a local model: testing and AI need no outbound access, telemetry is off by default, and licence validation and updates contact Total Shift Left, so ask us about offline licensing.
See the regulated-industries overview for cross-vertical positioning, or the deployment page for air-gapped topology details.
API testing proof for public sector
What the platform does for citizen-facing and inter-agency APIs. Each statement is checked against the shipping product; plan and add-on limits are stated where they apply.
| API type | What Shift-Left API does |
|---|---|
| Citizen identity and OpenID Connect | Auth profiles for OAuth 2.0 (five grant types, including authorization code with PKCE and device code), mutual TLS, JWT Bearer and multi-step sign-in, on every plan, so sign-in and token tests run without custom scripts. |
| Inter-agency exchanges (SOAP/WSDL and REST) | WSDL and OpenAPI import, XML and JSON assertions, and spec changes shown as a diff that is approved before import, so contract drift between agencies is visible.WS-Security is not supported; SOAP services authenticate with HTTP-level auth. |
| Case management and eligibility APIs | Boundary tests generated from minimum, maximum and enum constraints in the spec, and integration-test workflows that chain application, decision and notification steps. |
| Disconnected and agency-controlled networks | Self-hosted install on your own MongoDB, a local runner for internal APIs, and a self-hosted LLM (Ollama, LM Studio or vLLM) on Trial and Enterprise. Telemetry is off by default.Licence validation and updates contact Total Shift Left unless offline licensing is arranged with us. Shift-Left API holds no FedRAMP authorization; self-hosted, it runs inside your own boundary. |
| Audit evidence | Changes are logged with user, time, IP, device and before and after values; retention defaults to 90 days and is configurable up to unlimited on Enterprise. Records are read through the API. |
Public Sector API Test-Case Pack
30 public sector API test cases: citizen sign-in with OpenID Connect, assurance step-up, case access, eligibility rules and inter-agency data sharing.
Capability statements, not customer results: we do not publish customer names or outcomes we cannot share. The test-case pack lets your team check the approach against your own APIs.
Capabilities public-sector teams lean on
The platform features that map to FedRAMP/air-gapped constraints — self-hosted execution, SSO configuration, HashiCorp Vault secret references, and audit evidence.
Multi-AI
Choose OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, Google Gemini, Azure OpenAI and 15 more, or your own self-hosted model on Trial and Enterprise.
Learn moreShift-Left Agent
Run API tests from your own machine, against APIs only your network can reach.
Learn moreRBAC
Control who can view and edit tests, per project.
Learn moreTraceability (RTM)
Prove coverage from every requirement to the tests that verify it.
Learn moreSSO
Configure SAML 2.0 or OpenID Connect, with an Entra ID preset and group-to-role mapping.
Learn moreSecret Managers
Pull credentials from HashiCorp Vault at run time, so they never live in your tests.
Learn moreBring your authorizing official to the architect call
30-minute working call. Self-hosted deployment topology, air-gapped reference architecture, security questionnaire response, and SBOM summary shared on the call so the AO and security team can review in parallel.