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Defensics Protocol Fuzzing vs HCL AppScan comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Defensics Protocol Fuzzing
Average Rating
8.6
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
Fuzz Testing Tools (4th)
HCL AppScan
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (23rd), Static Application Security Testing (SAST) (18th), Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Quality Assurance solutions, they serve different purposes. Defensics Protocol Fuzzing is designed for Fuzz Testing Tools and holds a mindshare of 14.4%, down 22.4% compared to last year.
HCL AppScan, on the other hand, focuses on Application Security Tools, holds 2.3% mindshare, down 2.6% since last year.
Fuzz Testing Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Defensics Protocol Fuzzing14.4%
PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional35.5%
GitLab31.3%
Other18.799999999999997%
Fuzz Testing Tools
Application Security Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
HCL AppScan2.3%
SonarQube11.8%
Checkmarx One8.0%
Other77.9%
Application Security Tools
 

Featured Reviews

SK
Senior Technical Lead at HCL Technologies
Product security tests for switches and router sections
Codenomicon Defensics should be more advanced for the testing sector. It should be somewhat easy and flexible to install. What I see in the documentation isn't that. Even if something doesn't malfunction, sometimes it is hard to install and execute. The product needs video documentation. This would help a lot more.
Ravi Khanchandani - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder Director at Techsa Services
Has improved identification of encryption and authentication issues across cloud and on-prem applications
During the learning curve of onboarding HCL AppScan, we learned that HCL has altered the portfolio and now offers HCL AppScan 360, which has a much better look and feel with an improved user interface. However, there is one feature called SCA, which stands for Software Composition Analysis, that could be improved. When I'm doing an application scan, HCL AppScan has the ability to generate information about what components are in use. For example, if I'm scanning a web application, it shows me the various components being used. It tells me whether I have Java libraries, .NET frameworks, or other log management libraries such as Log4j, and what versions of those specific components are present. I would like to see more detailed reports from the tool. Currently, you can find out the components belonging to a specific software, but if detailed reporting became available, you would be in a better position to identify vulnerabilities. For instance, I could identify that I had the Log4j vulnerability and know that I need to fix my application accordingly. If they add the features I'm describing, I would consider giving them a higher rating. However, I've only been experienced with the product for three months.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The product is related to US usage with TLS contact fees, i.e. how more data center connections will help lower networking costs."
"Whatever the test suit they give, it is intelligent; it will understand the protocol and it will generate the test cases based on the protocol: protocol, message sequence, protocol, message structure, and because of that, we can eliminate a lot of unwanted test cases so we can execute the tests and complete them very quickly."
"The stability of this product is great; we tested it under multiple constraints and even on cloud services it is absolutely stable."
"ROI was 100%. Since there are no product suites available that provide the level of testing available with Codenomicon, the development, quality and security assurance departments know that the investment was correct."
"Simple and straightforward GUI."
"We have found multiple issues in our embedded system network protocols, related to buffer overflow. We have reduced some of these issues."
"We catch them, we fix them, and we can offer a higher quality product to our clients."
"The most valuable feature of HCL AppScan is scanning QR codes."
"With AppScan, we are now deploying less defects to production."
"We leverage it as a quality check against code."
"It provides a better integration for our ecosystem."
"Compared to other tools only AppScan supports special language."
"Now we just send it to AppScan and we can do other stuff like defining processes or dealing with management issues."
"It is a stable solution...It is a scalable solution...The initial setup or installation of HCL AppScan is easy."
 

Cons

"It does not support the complete protocol stack. There are some IoT protocols that are not supported and new protocols that are not supported."
"Sometimes, when we are testing embedded devices, when we trigger the test cases, the target will crash immediately. It is very difficult for us to identify the root cause of the crash because they do not provide sophisticated tools on the target side. They cover only the client-side application... They do not have diagnostic tools for the target side. Rather, they have them but they are very minimal and not very helpful."
"You can't implement proprietary ciphering algorithms, nor can you modify protocol models if you need to test customized public protocols."
"Codenomicon Defensics should be more advanced for the testing sector. It should be somewhat easy and flexible to install."
"It requires understanding the Defensics protocol."
"The tool should improve its output. Scanning is not a challenge anymore since there are many such tools available in the market. The product needs to focus on how its output is being used by end users. It should be also more user-friendly. One of the major challenges is in the tool's integration with applications that need to be scanned. Sometimes, the scanning is not proper."
"They have to improve support."
"It's a little bit basic when you talk about the Web Services. If AppScan improved its maturity on Web Services testing, that would be good."
"They could add a software component analysis tool."
"The pricing has room for improvement."
"We would like to see a check in the specific vulnerabilities in mobile applications or rooted devices, such as jailbreaking devices."
"Many silly false positives are produced."
"The dashboard, for AppScan or the Fortified fast tool, which we use needs to be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Licensing is a bit expensive."
"The product has premium pricing and could be more competitive."
"AppScan is a little bit expensive. IBM needs to work a little bit on the pricing model, decreasing the license cost."
"I would rate the product's pricing a nine out of ten. The product's pricing is expensive compared to the features that they offer."
"Pricing was the main reason that we went ahead with this solution as they were the lowest in the market."
"Our clients are willing to pay the extra money. It is expensive."
"The price is very expensive."
"With the features, that they offer, and the support, they offer, AppScan pricing is on a higher level."
"The tool was expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
8%
Construction Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise31
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What needs improvement with HCL AppScan?
During the learning curve of onboarding HCL AppScan, we learned that HCL has altered the portfolio and now offers HCL AppScan 360, which has a much better look and feel with an improved user interf...
What is your primary use case for HCL AppScan?
I'm currently working with BigFix and HCL AppScan. At least three people in my company are using HCL AppScan. Since we are a reseller, we run it in both lab environments and live production applica...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HCL AppScan?
AppScan is considered more cost-effective than Veracode, although I have not updated the exact pricing details. Companies often choose based on budget constraints, with Veracode being on the higher...
 

Also Known As

Codenomicon Defensics
IBM Security AppScan, Rational AppScan, AppScan
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Coriant, CERT-FI, Next Generation Networks
Essex Technology Group Inc., Cisco, West Virginia University, APIS IT