The Best Vulnerability Assessment and Penetration Testing (VAPT) Tools

Staying on top of your system's vulnerabilities is the key to network security. But that's not easy given the huge complexity and the many failure points present in it.

This is where Vulnerability Assessment and Penetration Tools (VAPT) come in handy as they do the penetration testing and generate reports that contain a list of vulnerabilities. In many ways, these tools act as a dedicated IT admin whose only task is to constantly monitor the networks and look for vulnerabilities.

Here is our list of the best Vulnerability Assessment and Penetration Testing Tools:

1. Intruder – EDITOR'S CHOICE A cloud-based vulnerability scanner provides a number of deployment options that include external and network scanning, Web application security testing, and cloud platform connection security. Run an on-demand scan or set it up to run on a schedule. Continuous testing is possible. Start a 14-day free trial.
2. Invicti Security Scanner Automated VAPT tool scans the system for vulnerabilities and prioritizes the fix for each. Such an automated system makes web application testing a simple and reliable process.
3. Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanner Comprehensive web applications testing solution that works well for all environments. It comes with a host of features to enhance cybersecurity at a low cost.
4. Metasploit Advanced tool that helps its users to stay one step ahead of cybercriminals by empowering them with the right tools and framework to quickly identify and mitigate vulnerabilities.
5. Nessus A vulnerability scanner that performs high-speed asset discovery, malware detection, target profiling, and more to keep your systems safe.
6. Burp Suite Application testing tool for identifying the vulnerabilities of websites and applications automatically.

Undoubtedly, these tools are a convenient way to monitor networks and this explains why many companies have come up with VAPT tools with flexible and comprehensive features.

The Best VAPT Tools

Here's a look at some of the tools to get an idea of what they offer and how they can benefit your business.

1. Intruder – FREE TRIAL

Intruder provides enterprise-grade security to thoroughly check an infrastructure for its vulnerabilities, so they can be fixed before hackers find it. With more than 140,000 pre-built security checks, it provides protection for all kinds of critical applications.

Features: The important features of this tool are:

• Integrates well with the CI/CD pipeline and cloud providers
• An intuitive interface that also makes it easy to set up and use
• It automatically analyses the vulnerabilities and prioritizes them
• Reports only actionable issues that are likely to impact the security or efficiency of systems
• Provides streamlined visibility

Pricing: The Intruder has three plans and they are:

• Essential ($101 /month) – Provides external and internal scans and checks for over 10,000 security vulnerabilities and web application flaws.
• Pro ($161 / month) – Unlimited scans on demand, emerging threat notifications, and API integrations besides the features of the Essential plan.
• Vanguard ($1,195 / month) – Manual verification of scan results by expert pen testers, impact verification, reduction of false positives, and enterprise-grade scanning.

Download: You can register for a 14-day free trial.

2. Invicti Security Scanner

Invicti Security Scanner is a VAPT tool that fully automates the web security process. It automatically scans for vulnerabilities and helps to prioritize the fix, and in the process, protects the web assets.

Features: Some of the key features of this tool are:

• Crawls and scans all legacy and modern web applications
• Automatically assigns a severity level to every vulnerability, to help developers prioritize the fix
• Continuously scans the Internet to discover new assets based on their IP addresses and SSL certificates
• Generates a proof-of-exploit or proof-of-concept to confirm that the vulnerabilities are not false positives
• The dashboards are comprehensive and give all the information you need
• Uses scanning agents to reduce the scan time.
• The reports are extensive and customizable.
• Complies with all major standards such as ISO 27001, HIPAA, and PCI DSS.
• Integrates well with CI/CD platforms such as Jenkins and Bamboo.

Pricing: Invicti offers three plans – Standard, Team, and Enterprise. They differ in the following important features.

For pricing, contact the sales team.

Download: There are no free trials, but you can get a demo by clicking here.

3. Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanner

Acunetix is a comprehensive web application and security solution that identifies vulnerabilities and enhances your cybersecurity – all at a low cost. In this sense, Acunetix is more than just a vulnerability scanner and can rather be categorized as a complete web security solution.

Features: The salient features of this tool are:

• Integrates well with many applications such as Jenkins, Jira, GitHub, and Mantis.
• Provides its own API for integration with in-house tools
• One of the fastest web security tools available today
• Has one of the lowest false-positive rates
• Uses resources efficiently to identify new vulnerabilities and handle existing ones
• Supports the use of multiple scanning engines that are deployed locally
• Works well on Linux, macOS, and Windows operating systems

Pricing: There are three pricing plans – Standard, Premium, and Acunetix 360. The Standard plan starts at $4500 while the Premium starts at $7000 per year. The cost of Acunetix 360 is customized based on the number of applications hosted on the cloud or on-premises.

Download: There is no free trial but click here for a demo.

4. Nessus

Nessus is another popular vulnerability scanning tool that scans all computers connected to a network and raises an alert at the first sign of intrusion or vulnerability, so these can be fixed at the earliest. It also comes with a host of convenient features that make scanning and fixing the vulnerabilities a quick and inexpensive process.

Features: The salient features of this tool are as follows.

• Stays on top of the latest vulnerabilities, so the same can be identified quickly
• Comes with many pre-built templates that help to quickly understand the presence of vulnerabilities.
• Meets all compliance requirements with its 450+ compliance and configuration templates
• Makes it easy to create custom reports that are based on customized views and vulnerability types
• Allows you to group vulnerabilities based on several factors
• Gives you the option to “snooze” selected items, so you can focus on the issues that matter the most to you.
• Provides live results that help you track the progress of every vulnerability
• Generates reports in many formats such as CSV and HTML.
• Comes with a low false-positive rate, thanks to its stringent implementation of six sigma processes.

Pricing: This tool comes in three plans and they are:

• Nessus Essentials (FREE) – Scans up to 16 IPs and is ideal for educators, students, and individuals who are starting their careers in this field.
• Nessus Professional ($2,790 per year) – Ideal for pen testers, security professionals, and consultants as it scans unlimited IPs, provides live results and comes with advanced support
• Tenable.io (Subscription-based) – This plan is most suited for enterprises of all sizes as it deploys unlimited scanners, enterprise scalability, predictive prioritization, role-based control, and advanced dashboards and reports.

Download: Click here to download the free version.

5. Burp Suite

Burp Suite is a tool that accelerates application security testing with its automated penetration testing and scanning. It uses the latest research in cybersecurity to beef up its offerings and to ensure that its tools are up-to-date with the latest vulnerabilities.

Features: Some of the top features of this tool are:

• Its powerful proxy makes it easy to modify any HTTP(S) communication that passes through your browser.
• Manages recon data well
• Supports manual testing and human-guided automation testing
• Exposes hidden vulnerabilities that are hard to spot
• Speeds up the granular workflows
• Checks vulnerable websites and applications with clickjacking tools
• Auto enumerates dynamic URLs and their parameters to understand the size of your target application
• Works well with web sockets
• Tests the quality and strength of random tokens to strengthen their efficacy

Pricing: There are two versions – Burp Suite Professional priced at $399 per user per year and the Burp Suite Enterprise.

This Enterprise version comes in three flavors,

• Launch ($9,585/year) – 15 concurrent scans and scans 105+ websites a week
• Grow ($17,565/year) – 35 concurrent scans and more than 245 websites a week
• Accelerate ($23,550/year) – 50+ concurrent scans and 350+ websites a week

Besides these two plans, it also has a Community Edition that comes with limited features and a bunch of manual tools for exploring your HTTPS traffic. It is FREE.

Download: Click here to download the latest version of the Community Edition.

6. Metasploit

Metasploit has advanced tools for penetration testing through which it provides detailed information about the security vulnerabilities in a web application or website. It also supports IDS Signature development and is widely being used to develop and execute exploit code against a remote target device.

Features: The key features of this tool are as follows.

• Easy to install and highly reliable, regardless of the platform or programming language used.
• Includes about 1700 exploits spread across 25+ platforms, so most vulnerabilities are recognized quickly.
• Provides modules for 500+ payloads including dynamic payloads, meterpreter payloads, and command shell payloads.
• Its post-exploitation code feature helps test multiple layers of deep penetration
• The framework is made of many models and interfaces to support remote pen testing
• Enables port forwarding and communication across networks

Pricing: Metasploit comes in two editions – the OpenSource Metasploit Framework that's available for FREE and the Metasploit Pro if you're a part of an IT security team or a penetration tester, as the latter edition comes with commercial support and more advanced features. Contact the sales team for custom pricing of the Metasploit Pro version.

Download: Click here to download the Metasploit Framework and click here to try the Metasploit Pro version for 14 days.

Choosing a VAPT Tool

To conclude, VAPT Tools are an essential part of your organization's security as it helps to identify threats and vulnerabilities before they create a profound impact. These tools come with advanced features that not just identify threats but also analyze, and prioritize them, so they can be fixed right away. All these features help to greatly mitigate threats and boost the overall security of your websites and applications.