When troubleshooting a 400 HTTP status code in Target API requests, what is the primary step?

Question

Options

• AValidate API token and permissions
• BCheck for malformed JSON payload
• CConfirm if the mbox exists
• DSynchronize catalog feeds

• A
  12% (5)
• B
  81% (35)
• C
  5% (2)
• D
  2% (1)

Explanation

A 400 Bad Request error signals that the server rejected the request due to client-side syntax issues - most commonly a malformed JSON payload (B). Since the server can't even parse the request, fixing the payload structure is always the first diagnostic step before investigating anything else.

Why the distractors are wrong:

• A (API token/permissions) - Authentication failures return 401 (Unauthorized) or 403 (Forbidden), not 400.
• C (mbox exists) - A missing or invalid mbox typically returns a 404 (Not Found) or a specific application-level error, not a 400.
• D (catalog feed sync) - Catalog synchronization is a data/backend concern unrelated to the HTTP request format; a sync issue wouldn't produce a 400.

Memory tip: Think "400 = Bad format, not bad credentials or bad content." If the server can't read what you sent, it returns 400 - so always inspect the JSON structure (missing braces, trailing commas, wrong data types) before chasing permissions or resource existence.

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