What Are SAST (Static Application Security Testing) Tools?

Static application security testing (SAST) tools automatically scan an application’s source code. The idea is to find flaws before they are deployed. White-box testing is performed using SAST tools, which involves examining the code based on inside knowledge of the application.

SAST detects vulnerabilities with precision, offering an evaluation down to the line of code. The following are the primary advantages of SAST tools:

• In one test, examine an application’s codebase.
• Before building or running the code, test the application.
• Identify vulnerabilities early in the software development life cycle (SDLC), when they are easiest and least expensive to resolve.

The following are the main limitations of SAST tools:

• Applications that are currently operating in staging or production environments cannot be tested. SAST tools can only examine code that is at rest.
• Misses the larger security context, such as security tools or integrated systems situated outside of the codebase.

Top 7 Tools for Static Application Security Testing (SAST)

Here are some of the market’s main SAST systems, along with their essential features, delivery methodology, and entry-level pricing.

1. WhiteSource

WhiteSource SAST exposes approximately 70 CWE types, including the OWASP Top 10 and SANS 25, in desktop, online, and mobile apps built on multiple platforms and frameworks. WhiteSource SAST is unique in that it is extremely quick — often 10 times faster than other SAST products — so your developers are never left waiting for results. WhiteSource SAST works seamlessly with your existing DevOps infrastructure and CI/CD pipeline, eliminating the need for developers to configure or trigger the scan individually.

WhiteSource has promised to apply its “remediation first” strategy to WhiteSource SAST by integrating WhiteSource Cure’s automated remediation capabilities. Vulnerability warnings and remedial pull requests will be presented immediately in developers’ usual workflow, giving developers with a more efficient experience than anything else on the market.

• Delivery: Cloud-based delivery paradigm.
• Pricing: is determined by the number of developers on an annual basis.

2. SonarQube

SonarQube Community Edition detects bugs and vulnerabilities, tracks code smells, evaluates and remediates technical debt, and offers code quality history and analytics. SonarQube can be integrated with CI/CD and its capabilities may be expanded with over 60 community plugins.

SonarQube can identify injection issues and send IDE alerts in real time. It may also provide information about quality gates and pull requests to the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) interface.

• Delivery: On-premises delivery model.
• Pricing: The community is free. Developers start at $150.

3. Veracode

Veracode examines application source code and delivers automatic security feedback via the CI/CD pipeline and integrated development environment (IDE). It offers SCA (software composition analysis), security management, an audit trail, and reporting.

Veracode provides a manual penetration testing method that enables experts to assess security test findings in order to reduce application risk, maintain regulatory compliance, and deliver security posture reports. Employees may also use Veracode to create security goals for development teams, configure risk mitigation procedures, and improve policy management operations.

Veracode interacts with CI/CD systems such as Apache Ant, Docker, Artifactory, Bugzilla, Bamboo, Gradle, Jira, Github, and others, and provides an API for additional customization.

Language assistance: Java (Java SE, Java EE), JDK and OpenJDK, C# and.NET, ASP.NET, C++, and JavaScript are among the 30 languages supported.

• Delivery: Cloud-based delivery paradigm.
• Pricing: Pricing is not made public.

4. Improve Static Code Analyzer

Build tools, IDE security notifications, bug tracking, and code repository scanning are all provided by Fortify. It interfaces with Eclipse and Visual Studio on the IDE side, including gamified teaching to encourage developers to use secure coding methods. With machine learning-assisted auditing, Fortify delivers an Audit Assistant that lowers human audit time by reducing false positives.

Fortify provides comprehensive vulnerability coverage, including 810 SAST vulnerability categories that correlate with vulnerability lists such as OWASP Top 10, CWE/SANS Top 25, and DISA STIG. It provides security automation with Swagger-supported RESTful APIs, connects with GitHub, and has plugins for Bamboo, Visual Studio Team Services, and Jenkins.

Language support: ABAP/BSP, ActionScript, ASP.NET, C# (.NET), C/C++, COBOL, Go, Java (including Android), JavaScript/AJAX, JSP, Kotlin, Objective-C, and Objective-C++ are all supported.

• Delivery: Cloud, on-premises, and hybrid delivery models are available.
• Pricing: Pricing is not made public.

5. Codacy

Codacy gives code insights that go beyond security, such as the project’s present code quality and its health over time. It can recognise the style and amount of complexity of the code and visually display hotspots highlighting quality concerns throughout the source. Codacy offers inline annotations in the IDE, 1-click commit recommendations, and reporting that shows how developers adhere to code standards.

Codacy interacts directly with GitHub and gives notifications through pull request comments or Slack.

Language support: Over 40 languages and frameworks are supported, including Kubernetes, Go, Objective-C, Python, Sass, Terraform, Transact-SQL, Swift, and PowerShell.

• Delivery: Cloud and on-premises delivery models are available.
• Pricing: Open-source software is free. Pro—$15 per user per month.

6.AppScan

AppScan checks for vulnerabilities and delivers a report with remedy recommendations. It offers scanning technologies like as SAST, DAST, IAST, and Open Source dependency scanning. AppScan has a “slider” option that allows you to apply the optimal combination of SAST and DAST to balance speed and coverage.

AppScan supports automation through APIs or the codeless AppScan Automation Framework, which allows you to design integrations to fit unique requirements. It has pre-built connectors with common CI/CD technologies.

• Delivery: On-premises and cloud delivery models are available.
• Pricing: Pricing information is not publicly available.

7.CxSAST Checkmarx

Checkmarx CxSAST is a static code analyzer that discovers security and compliance concerns without the requirement to build or compile the code. CxSAST creates a logical graph of the code’s elements and flows and queries it using a collection of hundreds of predefined queries to find security vulnerabilities and business logic errors. Custom queries for security and functional testing may be configured using the CxSAST Auditor tool.

CxSAST produces scan results in the integrated development environment (IDE) (Visual Studio, Eclipse, and IntelliJ), either as an interactive dashboard or as static reports. Additional workflow metadata is provided to each successive scan to offer context on remedial activities.The Open Source Analysis (CxOSA) module of the programme provides open-source component vulnerability warnings, license and compliance management, policy enforcement, and reporting.

CxSAST interacts with Apache Ant and Maven, Git repositories, JIRA, GitHub, vulnerability management systems such as ThreadFix, Bamboo, and Jenkins, SonarQube, and source code management tools such as TFS.

Language support: Java, C#, VB.NET, ASP, C/C++, PHP, Ruby, JavaScript, HTML5, PL/SQL, Groovy, and Scala are among the languages supported.

• Delivery: Cloud, on-premises, and hybrid delivery models are available.
• Pricing: Pricing is not made public.