Base62
An encoding that represents data using 62 alphanumeric characters (0-9, a-z, A-Z), without ambiguous symbols, suitable for URLs or identifiers.
Base62 uses the 62 alphanumeric ASCII characters (10 digits + 26 lowercase + 26 uppercase letters) to encode binary or random values into dense, URL-safe strings. Unlike Base64, it avoids `+`, `/`, and `=` — characters that require escaping in URLs and HTTP headers. It's common in short identifiers: URL shorteners, public IDs, session tokens, and API keys. With 62 characters per position, 22 characters yield ~131 bits of entropy — more than enough to resist collisions and brute-force attacks. In Normadata, API keys follow the format `nd_{prefix}_{22 chars base62}`. The prefix (`live` or `test`) signals the environment; the 22 base62 characters are the secret part, generated with a cryptographic PRNG. The compact format copies and pastes cleanly, requires no URL-encoding, and is visually distinct from JWTs or other token formats.