About AppSecNews

Independent research on application security tools, for the people who have to choose them.

Picking a SAST scanner, an SCA tool or a WAF usually means reading a dozen vendor pages that all promise the same thing. AppSecNews exists to cut through that. Every tool is described by people who understand how it works, in the same structure and to the same standard, so you can compare like with like and see the trade-offs before you commit.

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Tool profiles
236
Categories
13
Top 10 lists
12
Paid listings
0

Who does the research

Our research is carried out by independent security experts: practitioners who work in application security and have to live with the tools they write about. They know what a noisy scanner does to a development team, why a tool that looks complete in a demo can stall in a real pipeline, and which questions a buyer should ask before signing.

They do not work for the vendors they cover, and they are not paid by vendors. We do not publish their names. That is deliberate: it keeps attention on the work rather than on the person, and it keeps our researchers out of reach of the sales pressure that follows anyone known to influence buying decisions.

What you can hold us to is the standard. Every profile follows the same published rules, every page is reviewed by an editor before it goes live, and the editors answer for every word.

How a profile is made

  1. Facts first

    Every profile starts from what can be checked: the product name, its website, the category it belongs to and how it is licensed. Nothing is copied from vendor marketing or from other directories.

  2. Written by a practitioner

    An independent security expert writes the profile in five fixed sections: what it does, where it fits, strengths, limitations and who it suits. They describe the mechanism first and the fit second, the way you would brief a colleague.

  3. Checked against the standard

    Automated checks refuse pricing, version numbers, dated claims and missing sections before an editor reads a word. An editor then reviews the profile for accuracy, tone and fairness.

  4. Kept honest after publishing

    Readers and vendors send corrections. Vendors can propose changes to their own listings, but every change is reviewed by an editor and published only if it meets the same standard.

Editorial policy

Six rules apply to every profile, list and guide on the site. They are why a profile here reads differently from a vendor page.

No pricing
Prices change by deal, by region and by quarter. A number on a profile would be wrong for most readers most of the time, so profiles never carry one.
No version numbers or dated claims
Profiles describe what a tool is and how it works, not what shipped last month. That keeps them true for longer and makes it obvious when they are not.
No invented scores
No star ratings, benchmark tables or market share claims that cannot be checked. Rankings in Top 10 lists are editorial judgements, and each entry says why it made the cut.
Every tool has limitations
A profile that only praises is marketing. Each one names real trade-offs, so you can see where a tool stops before you find out in a proof of concept.
Coverage is never for sale
Vendors cannot pay to be listed, to change what a profile says, or to move up a ranking. Paid vendor packages cover portal features such as editing requests, buyer enquiries and compliance documents.
Advertising is labelled
Sponsored placements say Sponsored, carry no rank number and sit apart from the editorial content. They never change a profile or a list.

Working with vendors

Vendors are welcome here, on the same terms as everyone else. A vendor can claim the profile of its tool, keep the facts current, propose changes and hear from buyers who ask for a demo. A vendor whose tool is missing can submit it for listing.

What a vendor cannot do is buy an opinion. Proposed changes go to an editor, who applies them only when they are accurate and meet the standard. The limitations section stays, whoever asks.

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Corrections

We get things wrong sometimes, and products change. If a profile is inaccurate or out of date, tell us. Every correction is read by an editor, and a confirmed error is fixed on the page.

Send a correction