HCL AppScan vs Synopsys Defensics comparison

The compared HCLSoftware and Black Duck solutions aren't in the same category. HCLSoftware is ranked #13 in AS , with an average rating of 8.0, and holds a 2.6% mindshare in the category. Black Duck is ranked #5 in FTT , and holds a 19.8% mindshare. Additionally, 82% of HCLSoftware users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Black Duck users who would recommend it.

HCL AppScan

Read 42 HCL AppScan reviews

4,509 Views
3,469 Comparison Views

82% willing to recommend

Synopsys Defensics

Read 4 Synopsys Defensics reviews

159 Views
97 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

HCL AppScan

Synopsys Defensics

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between HCL AppScan and Synopsys Defensics based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Sonar, Veracode, Checkmarx and others in Application Security Tools.

To learn more, read our detailed Application Security Tools Report (Updated: November 2024).

Buyer's Guide

Application Security Tools

November 2024

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Helped 816,406 peers since 2012

Categories and Ranking

HCL AppScan

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

5.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Security Tools (13th), Static Application Security Testing (SAST) (12th), Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) (1st)

Synopsys Defensics

Average Rating

8.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Fuzz Testing Tools (5th)

Mindshare comparison

While both are Quality Assurance solutions, they serve different purposes. HCL AppScan is designed for Application Security Tools and holds a mindshare of 2.6%, down 2.8% compared to last year.
Synopsys Defensics, on the other hand, focuses on Fuzz Testing Tools, holds 19.8% mindshare, up 12.6% since last year.

Application Security Tools

Fuzz Testing Tools

Featured Reviews

Gladwin Christian

QA manager at SmartStream Technologies ltd.

A useful tool to scan applications that can be easily installed

Given that we have been using HCL AppScan for many years, I think the setup process is not difficult at all. Sometimes, some issues stop or prevent my company from moving forward with the product's setup phase. We have to call HCL's support team and engage in long discussions to smoothly carry out the setup phase. In general, the product's setup phase is not difficult in our company. The solution is deployed on an on-premises model. The licenses for the solution are available only on cloud deployments nowadays. The solution is already installed in our environment. Every time a new release or software comes out from HCL, our company does a scan, which takes maybe a day or two.

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it_user586716

Application Secutiy Engineer at a healthcare company with 11-50 employees

Technical support provided protocol-specific documentation to prove that some positives were not false.

A security assurance engineer was able to perform due diligence across all network-facing protocols. My prior organization designed, developed and deployed a Network Attached Storage (NAS) appliance. A key part of the company wide security assurance program for all products, is to perform penetration testing against all network facing IP ports. For the web, SSL and RESTful APIs, there are very good COTS and open source tools to perform Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) testing. Unfortunately for NAS protocols like SMB, NFS, CIFS, and iSCSI, I researched and found that Codenomicon Defensics was the only viable source to satisfy our DAST requirements. Through the use of Selenium for automated web testing, it was easily found out that Codenomicon Defensics could be integrated into our Continuous Integration / Continuous Deployment (CI / CD) Agile processes, specific to automated testing. Also, like many of the other application security testing products, Defensics incorporates automatic update support and works on Windows, MacOS and Linux desktops.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of HCL AppScan is its integration with the SDLC, particularly during the coding phase."

"The solution is easy to use."

"The solution offers services in a few specific development languages."

"It is easy it is to use. It is quick to find things, because of the code scanning tools. It's quite simple to use and it is very good the way it reports the findings."

"The solution is easy to install. I would rate the product's setup between six to seven out of ten. The deployment time depends on the applications that need to be scanned. We have a development and operations team to take care of the product's maintenance."

"It identifies all the URLs and domains on its own and then performs tests and provides the results."

"It was easy to set up."

"It highlights, with several grades of severity, the types of vulnerabilities, so we can focus on the most severe security vulnerabilities in the code."

More HCL AppScan pros

"We have found multiple issues in our embedded system network protocols, related to buffer overflow. We have reduced some of these issues."

"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... Because of that, we can eliminate a lot of unwanted test cases, so we can execute the tests and complete them very quickly."

"The product is related to US usage with TLS contact fees, i.e. how more data center connections will help lower networking costs."

Cons

"Many silly false positives are produced."

"Scans become slow on large websites."

"They should have a better UI for dashboards."

"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."

"One thing which I think can be improved is the CI/CD Integration"

"The databases for HCL are small and have room for improvement."

"I would love to see more containers. Many of the tools are great, they require an amount of configuration, setup and infrastructure. If most the applications were in a container, I think everything would be a little bit faster, because all our clients are now using containers."

"We would like to see a check in the specific vulnerabilities in mobile applications or rooted devices, such as jailbreaking devices."

More HCL AppScan cons

"Codenomicon Defensics should be more advanced for the testing sector. It should be somewhat easy and flexible to install."

"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."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool was expensive."

"Our clients are willing to pay the extra money. It is expensive."

"The product has premium pricing and could be more competitive."

"I rate the product's price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is low, and ten is high. HCL AppScan is an expensive tool."

"The solution is cheap."

"The solution is moderately priced."

"The price of HCL AppScan is okay, in my opinion. You just buy HCL AppScan and don't pay anything anymore, meaning it is just a one-time purchase."

"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."

More HCL AppScan pricing and cost advice

"Licensing is a bit expensive."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

19%

Financial Services Firm

14%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Government

10%

Computer Software Company

22%

Manufacturing Company

18%

Financial Services Firm

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about HCL AppScan?

The most valuable feature of HCL AppScan is its integration with the SDLC, particularly during the coding phase.

See all answers

What needs improvement with HCL AppScan?

They could incorporate AI to enhance vulnerability detection and improve the product's reporting capabilities.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for HCL AppScan?

We use AppScan primarily for security testing and performance monitoring across our systems.

See all answers

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Fortify on Demand vs HCL AppScan

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PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional vs HCL AppScan

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SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) vs Synopsys Defensics

Compared 27% of the time

Snyk vs Synopsys Defensics

Compared 25% of the time

Fortify on Demand vs Synopsys Defensics

Compared 10% of the time

PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional vs Synopsys Defensics

Compared 9% of the time

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Compared 9% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

HCL AppScan

November 2024

Download HCL AppScan product report

Buyer's Guide

GitLab vs. Synopsys Defensics

October 2024

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Also Known As

IBM Security AppScan, Rational AppScan, AppScan

Defensics, Codenomicon Defensics

Learn More

HCLSoftware

Black Duck

Overview

IBM Security AppScan enhances web application security and mobile application security, improves application security program management and strengthens regulatory compliance. By scanning your web and mobile applications prior to deployment, AppScan enables you to identify security vulnerabilities and generate reports and fix recommendations.

Defensics® fuzz testing is a comprehensive, powerful, and automated black box solution that enables organizations to effectively and efficiently discover and remediate security weaknesses in software. By taking a systematic and intelligent approach to negative testing, Defensics allows organizations to ensure software security without compromising on product innovation, increasing time to market, or inflating operational costs.

Sample Customers

Essex Technology Group Inc., Cisco, West Virginia University, APIS IT

Coriant, CERT-FI, Next Generation Networks

Buyer's Guide

Application Security Tools

November 2024

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