Contrast Security Assess vs Fortify WebInspect comparison

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Contrast Security Assess and Fortify WebInspect based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Application Security Testing (AST) solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
To learn more, read our detailed Contrast Security Assess vs. Fortify WebInspect Report (Updated: May 2022).
765,386 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"When we access the application, it continuously monitors and detects vulnerabilities.""We use the Contrast OSS feature that allows us to look at third-party, open-source software libraries, because it has a cool interface where you can look at all the different libraries. It has some really cool additional features where it gives us how many instances in which something has been used... It tells us it has been used 10 times out of 20 workloads, for example. Then we know for sure that OSS is being used.""This has changed the way that developers are looking at usage of third-party libraries, upfront. It's changing our model of development and our culture of development to ensure that there is more thought being put into the usage of third-party libraries.""I am impressed with the product's identification of alerts and vulnerabilities.""By far, the thing that was able to provide value was the immediate response while testing ahead of release, in real-time.""It is a stable solution...Contrast Security Assess is one of the first players in this market, so they have experience and customers, especially abroad. Overall, it's a good product.""No other tool does the runtime scanning like Contrast does. Other static analysis tools do static scanning, but Contrast is runtime analysis, when the routes are exercised. That's when the scan happens. This is a tool that has a very unique capability compared to other tools. That's what I like most about Contrast, that it's runtime.""The most valuable feature is the continuous monitoring aspect: the fact that we don't have to wait for scans to complete for the tool to identify vulnerabilities. They're automatically identified through developers' business-as-usual processes."

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"It's a well-known platform for doing dynamic application scanning.""The most valuable feature is the static analysis.""There are lots of small settings and tools, like an HTTP editor, that are very useful.""The solution is easy to use.""The most valuable feature of this solution is the ability to make our customers more secure.""The user interface is ok and it is very simple to use.""It is scalable and very easy to use.""Technical support has been good."

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Cons
"The setup of the solution is different for each application. That's the one thing that has been a challenge for us. The deployment itself is simple, but it's tough to automate because each application is different, so each installation process for Contrast is different.""I think there was activity underway to support the centralized configuration control. There are ways to do it, but I think they were productizing more of that.""The product's retesting part needs improvement. The tool also needs improvement in the suggestions provided for fixing vulnerabilities. It relies more on documentation rather than on quick fixes.""I would like to see them come up with more scanning rules.""The out-of-the-box reporting could be improved. We need to write our own APIs to make the reporting more robust.""Regarding the solution's OSS feature, the one drawback that we do have is that it does not have client-side support. We'll be missing identification of libraries like jQuery or JavaScript, and such, that are client-side.""The solution needs to improve flexibility...The scalability of the product is a problem in the solution, especially from a commercial perspective.""Contrast's ability to support upgrades on the actual agents that get deployed is limited. Our environment is pretty much entirely Java. There are no updates associated with that. You have to actually download a new version of the .jar file and push that out to your servers where your app is hosted. That can be quite cumbersome from a change-management perspective."

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"It requires improvement in terms of scanning. The application scan heavily utilizes the resources of an on-premise server. 32 GB RAM is very high for an enterprise web application.""We have had a problem with authentification.""We have often encountered scanning errors.""It took us between eight and ten hours to scan an entire site, which is somewhat slow and something that I think can be improved.""Not sufficiently compatible with some of our systems.""The scanner could be better.""A localized version, for example, in Korean would be a big improvement to this solution.""Our biggest complaint about this product is that it freezes up, and literally doesn't work for us."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "I like the per-application licensing model... We just license the app and we look at different vulnerabilities on that app and we remediate within the app. It's simpler."
  • "You only get one license for an application. Ours are very big, monolithic applications with millions of lines of code. We were able to apply one license to one monolithic application, which is great. We are happy with the licensing. Pricing-wise, they are industry-standard, which is fine."
  • "The good news is that the agent itself comes in two different forms: the unlicensed form and the licensed form. Unlicensed gives use of that software composition analysis for free. Thereafter, if you apply a license to that same agent, that's when the instrumentation takes hold. So one of my suggestions is to do what we're doing: Deploy the agent to as many applications as possible, with just the SCA feature turned on with no license applied, and then you can be more choosy and pick which teams will get the license applied."
  • "For what it offers, it's a very reasonable cost. The way that it is priced is extremely straightforward. It works on the number of applications that you use, and you license a server. It is something that is extremely fair, because it doesn't take into consideration the number of requests, etc. It is only priced based on the number of onboarded applications. It suits our model as well, because we have huge traffic. Our number of applications is not that large, so the pricing works great for us."
  • "It's a tiered licensing model. The more you buy, as you cross certain quantity thresholds, the pricing changes. If you have a smaller environment, your licensing costs are going to be different than a larger environment... The licensing is primarily per application. An application can be as many agents as you need. If you've got 10 development servers and 20 production servers and 50 QA servers, all of those agents can be reporting as a single application that utilizes one license."
  • "The product's pricing is low. I would rate it a two out of ten."
  • "The solution is expensive."
  • More Contrast Security Assess Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "It’s a fair price for the solution."
  • "The pricing is not clear and while it is not high, it is difficult to understand."
  • "Our licensing is such that you can only run one scan at a time, which is inconvenient."
  • "Its price is almost similar to the price of AppScan. Both of them are very costly. Its price could be reduced because it can be very costly for unlimited IT scans, etc. I'm not sure, but it can go up to $40,000 to $50,000 or more than that."
  • "The price is okay."
  • "This solution is very expensive."
  • "Fortify WebInspect is a very expensive product."
  • More Fortify WebInspect Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:When we access the application, it continuously monitors and detects vulnerabilities.
    Top Answer:The product's pricing is low. I would rate it a two out of ten.
    Top Answer:Technical support for the solution should be faster. We have to further analyze what kind of CVEs are in the reported libraries and what part of the code is affected. That analysis can be added to the… more »
    Top Answer:The solution's technical support was very helpful.
    Top Answer:Fortify WebInspect's shortcoming stems from the fact that it is a very expensive product in Korea, which makes it difficult for its potential customers to introduce the product in their IT… more »
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    4
    Average Words per Review
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    8.5
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    7.3
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    Contrast Assess
    Micro Focus WebInspect, WebInspect
    Learn More
    Overview

    Contrast Security is the world’s leading provider of security technology that enables software applications to protect themselves against cyberattacks, heralding the new era of self-protecting software. Contrast's patented deep security instrumentation is the breakthrough technology that enables highly accurate assessment and always-on protection of an entire application portfolio, without disruptive scanning or expensive security experts. Only Contrast has sensors that work actively inside applications to uncover vulnerabilities, prevent data breaches, and secure the entire enterprise from development, to operations, to production.

    Fortify WebInspect is an automated DAST solution that helps security professionals and QA testers uncover security vulnerabilities and configuration concerns by providing complete vulnerability detection. This is accomplished by mimicking real-world external security attacks on a live application in order to discover and prioritize concerns for root-cause study. Fortify WebInspect provides a number of REST APIs for easier integration, as well as the ability to be maintained via an intuitive UI or totally automated.

    Fortify WebInspect may be used as a completely automated solution to suit DevOps and scaling requirements, and it integrates seamlessly with the SDLC. REST APIs aid in closer integration by automating scans and ensuring that compliance standards are satisfied. Users can make use of pre-built integrations for Micro Focus Lifecycle Management (ALM) and Quality Center, as well as other security testing and management platforms.

    Teams may reuse current scripts and tools thanks to powerful connectors. Any Selenium script can be simply integrated with Fortify WebInspect. Fortify WebInspect supports Swagger and OData formats via the WISwag command line tool, allowing it to work with any DevOps workflow. A scan template can be pre-configured by ScanCentral Admin and sent to users to scan their apps, with zero security knowledge required.

    Fortify WebInspect Features

    Fortify WebInspect has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

    • Security testing of functional applications (FAST): FAST can use all of the functional tests in the same way as IAST does, but it will continue crawling. FAST will not miss anything that a functional test misses.
    • Insights from a hacker's perspective: View discoveries such as client-side frameworks and version number. These are findings that, if not addressed, could lead to vulnerabilities.
    • Workflow macros HAR files: Fortify WebInspect can scan workflows with HAR files, ensuring that crucial content is not missed.
    • Management of compliance: Preconfigured policies and reports for all key online application security compliance regulations, such as PCI DSS, DISA STIG, NIST 800-53, ISO 27K, OWASP, and HIPAA.
    • Horizontal scaling can help you speed up your work: Using Kubernetes, horizontal scaling creates little versions of WebInspect that only process JavaScript. This allows the scans to run in parallel, resulting in significantly faster scans.
    • Scan any API for better accuracy: Get the complete picture on APIs, including SOAP, Rest, Swagger, OpenAPI, and Postman.
    • Managing the security of enterprise applications: To meet DevOps requirements, monitor trends within an application and take action on the most critical issues first.
    • Deployment options: With the flexibility of on-premise, SaaS, or AppSec-as-a-service, you can get started immediately and scale as needed.

    Fortify WebInspect Benefits

    There are many benefits to implementing Fortify WebInspect. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

    • Vulnerabilities are discovered faster and earlier.
    • Automation and agent technology can help you save time.
    • Users can utilize crawl web technologies and modern frameworks.
    • ScanCentral DAST helps you manage enterprise app security risk.

    Reviews from Real Users

    Fortify WebInspect stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. One major one is its robust centralized dashboard, which gives insight into all vulnerabilities.

    Milin S., an Information Security Architect at a real estate/law firm, writes of the product, “Reporting, centralized dashboard, and bird's eye view of all vulnerabilities are the most valuable features. The vulnerability management part of it is very easy. We can suppress or comment on each vulnerability and assign a vulnerability to an individual risk owner, which makes the work easy.”

    Sample Customers
    Williams-Sonoma, Autodesk, HUAWEI, Chromeriver, RingCentral, Demandware.
    Aaron's
    Top Industries
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Financial Services Firm17%
    Computer Software Company11%
    Manufacturing Company9%
    Insurance Company9%
    REVIEWERS
    Real Estate/Law Firm20%
    Financial Services Firm20%
    Manufacturing Company20%
    Computer Software Company10%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company16%
    Financial Services Firm16%
    Government14%
    Manufacturing Company11%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business18%
    Midsize Enterprise27%
    Large Enterprise55%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business16%
    Midsize Enterprise9%
    Large Enterprise75%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business28%
    Midsize Enterprise6%
    Large Enterprise67%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business17%
    Midsize Enterprise12%
    Large Enterprise70%
    Buyer's Guide
    Contrast Security Assess vs. Fortify WebInspect
    May 2022
    Find out what your peers are saying about Contrast Security Assess vs. Fortify WebInspect and other solutions. Updated: May 2022.
    765,386 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Contrast Security Assess is ranked 22nd in Application Security Testing (AST) with 11 reviews while Fortify WebInspect is ranked 2nd in Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) with 17 reviews. Contrast Security Assess is rated 8.8, while Fortify WebInspect is rated 7.0. The top reviewer of Contrast Security Assess writes "We're gathering vulnerability data from multiple environments in real time, fundamentally changing how we identify issues in applications". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Fortify WebInspect writes "A powerful tool catering to multiple use cases that provides reasonably good technical support". Contrast Security Assess is most compared with Veracode, Seeker, Checkmarx, OWASP Zap and HCL AppScan, whereas Fortify WebInspect is most compared with PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional, Fortify on Demand, OWASP Zap, Acunetix and Aqua Cloud Security Platform. See our Contrast Security Assess vs. Fortify WebInspect report.

    We monitor all Application Security Testing (AST) reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.