How to Detect Invalid File Threats in PHP

The free-to-use Virus Scanning API provided in this article leverages a continuously updated list of more than 17 million virus and malware signatures to protect your system from known threats. It also performs in-depth file content verification, allowing you to set a custom threat rule blocking Invalid Files in your file upload process. Invalid files can cause a variety of issues in your system, and they can also carry hidden threats injected by client-side threat actors.

You can take advantage of this API for free using ready-to-run PHP code examples. Start by running the following command to install the PHP SDK:

composer require cloudmersive/cloudmersive_virusscan_api_client

After that, copy the below code to structure your API call:

<?php
require_once(__DIR__ . '/vendor/autoload.php');

// Configure API key authorization: Apikey
$config = Swagger\Client\Configuration::getDefaultConfiguration()->setApiKey('Apikey', 'YOUR_API_KEY');



$apiInstance = new Swagger\Client\Api\ScanApi(
    
    
    new GuzzleHttp\Client(),
    $config
);
$input_file = "/path/to/inputfile"; // \SplFileObject | Input file to perform the operation on.
$allow_executables = true; // bool | Set to false to block executable files (program code) from being allowed in the input file.  Default is false (recommended).
$allow_invalid_files = true; // bool | Set to false to block invalid files, such as a PDF file that is not really a valid PDF file, or a Word Document that is not a valid Word Document.  Default is false (recommended).
$allow_scripts = true; // bool | Set to false to block script files, such as a PHP files, Python scripts, and other malicious content or security threats that can be embedded in the file.  Set to true to allow these file types.  Default is false (recommended).
$allow_password_protected_files = true; // bool | Set to false to block password protected and encrypted files, such as encrypted zip and rar files, and other files that seek to circumvent scanning through passwords.  Set to true to allow these file types.  Default is false (recommended).
$allow_macros = true; // bool | Set to false to block macros and other threats embedded in document files, such as Word, Excel and PowerPoint embedded Macros, and other files that contain embedded content threats.  Set to true to allow these file types.  Default is false (recommended).
$allow_xml_external_entities = true; // bool | Set to false to block XML External Entities and other threats embedded in XML files, and other files that contain embedded content threats.  Set to true to allow these file types.  Default is false (recommended).
$allow_insecure_deserialization = true; // bool | Set to false to block Insecure Deserialization and other threats embedded in JSON and other object serialization files, and other files that contain embedded content threats.  Set to true to allow these file types.  Default is false (recommended).
$allow_html = true; // bool | Set to false to block HTML input in the top level file; HTML can contain XSS, scripts, local file accesses and other threats.  Set to true to allow these file types.  Default is false (recommended) [for API keys created prior to the release of this feature default is true for backward compatability].
$restrict_file_types = "restrict_file_types_example"; // string | Specify a restricted set of file formats to allow as clean as a comma-separated list of file formats, such as .pdf,.docx,.png would allow only PDF, PNG and Word document files.  All files must pass content verification against this list of file formats, if they do not, then the result will be returned as CleanResult=false.  Set restrictFileTypes parameter to null or empty string to disable; default is disabled.

try {
    $result = $apiInstance->scanFileAdvanced($input_file, $allow_executables, $allow_invalid_files, $allow_scripts, $allow_password_protected_files, $allow_macros, $allow_xml_external_entities, $allow_insecure_deserialization, $allow_html, $restrict_file_types);
    print_r($result);
} catch (Exception $e) {
    echo 'Exception when calling ScanApi->scanFileAdvanced: ', $e->getMessage(), PHP_EOL;
}
?>

You’ll need to provide a free-tier API key in the $config parameter to authenticate your requests. After that, you can set custom threat rules against invalid files and a variety of other non-malware threats.