Web Application Security Testing

Secure your web applications with our industry-leading automated and manual web app security testing services.

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Aug 2023 Accreditations updated

What is Web App Security Testing?

Rootshell Security’s Web Application Security Testing services consist of automated and manual offerings to help keep your web applications secure.

Our highly experienced testing team carry out a range of cutting-edge, rigorous, and insightful services to identify vulnerabilities before they can be exploited.

As well as web application security testing, we offer mobile application testing (Android and iOS), API application testing, and desktop application testing.

Why is Web Application Security Testing important?

Web applications are popular targets for threat actors. If exploitable vulnerabilities exist, applications can offer convenient entry points into your organisation’s network. This could enable an attacker to steal your organisation’s sensitive information or compromise an entire system. Web application security testing services help you identify and remediate issues before they can be exploited.

View Your Web App Test Results Alongside Your Other Threat Services

The Rootshell Platform is a vendor-agnostic vulnerability management solution that puts you at the centre of your IT security ecosystem. Consolidate assessment results, accelerate remediation from start to finish, and gain real-time insight into your ever-changing threat landscape.

Rootshell Security’s Web Application Security Testing services

We offer three manual web application security testing assessments and a monthly automated scanning service.

Our web application security testing services are carried out to Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) standards; these are industry-recognised guidelines for web app security.

1. Full OWASP Web Application Assessment (Manual)

This is an in-depth, thorough, and detailed security assessment for web applications. We can carry out an extensive test that seeks to identify the full range of web app vulnerabilities defined within the OWASP testing guide.

Features:

  • Manual assessment, white box approach
  • Compliance-based
  • A risk-based approach testing across application content, based on the OWASP full testing guide
  • In-depth analysis of authorisation schema and business logic
  • Up to three role levels

To cover more user roles, mobile code, RIA, or extensive web applications, including APIs, more details for consultant-led scoping activity will be required.

Benefits:

  • Fully assess the security posture of your web app
  • Fortify your most critical web application
  • Gain detailed insights that support your next steps

2. Essential OWASP Top 10 Assessment (Manual)

Keeping budget constraints and application criticality in mind, this assessment tests your web applications for OWASP’s top ten most serious software vulnerabilities. We will provide you with a clear overview of the most critical vulnerabilities that could be threatening your organisation.

Features:

  • Manual assessment, white box approach
  • Compliance-based
  • Most critical OWASP vulnerabilities
  • Basic access control testing
  • Basic review of session and business logic

Benefits:

  • Gain rapid, precise, and concise awareness of urgent vulnerabilities
  • Carry out high quality assessments with budget or time constraints
  • Test multiple web applications cost effectively

3. Web Application Penetration Test (Manual)

Put your security posture to the test with our Web Application Penetration Test. We can attempt to exploit issues within your web application through an uninformed attacker perspective. The aim is to gain unauthorised access to your application data and other systems to demonstrate how you could be breached.

Features:

  • Manual assessment, black box approach
  • Vulnerabilities are identified, exploited, and leveraged
  • Unauthorised access is demonstrated

Benefits:

  • Test your defences against a breach
  • Uncover weaknesses that traditional assessments may miss
  • Improve your security strategy by understanding how threat actors operate

4. Monthly Scanning Service (Automated)

Continuously test your web applications for ultimate security. Our Monthly Scanning service gives you peace of mind between standalone assessments by scanning for vulnerabilities on a monthly basis. You can choose to enhance this service by leveraging our Security Operations Centre (SOC) analysts through the inclusion of manual testing hours.

Features:

  • Cloud based platform
  • Dynamic reporting
  • Monthly scanning
  • Manual contextual analysis
  • Option to add pen testing hours to allow further manual investigation of issues identified

Benefits:

  • Protect your web applications year-round with continuous testing
  • Maximize budgets with a blended approach
  • Reduce time investigating false positives and non-issues with our expert manual reviews
  • Vendor agnostic, removing the stress of switching scanning solutions

Why Rootshell’s Web Application Security Testing services?

  • CREST-certified pen testing: CREST is an internationally recognised accreditation for penetration testing services. Our CREST-certified testers carry out your web app penetration tests to the highest technical and ethical standards.
  • Quality assured: We deliver our web app security testing services to rigorous industry standards, such as Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) guidelines, the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST), and the Penetration Testing Execution Standard (PTES).
  • Expert advice and support: Following your web application security test, our testers will provide you with expert guidance and support, ensuring you know exactly how to remediate and reduce risk.

Frequently Asked Questions about Web App Security Testing

Web application security testing services utilise different testing methods, which may be automated or manual depending on the test being carried out. Most web app security tests use a combination of both, including:

Vulnerability scans: an automated method of web application testing, involving the use of scanning tools to identify web app security issues.

Web application assessment: a manual white-box test, carried out as an authenticated user (i.e. logged-in). This allows our testers to review session and business logic using multiple user accounts and roles.

Web application penetration test: a black-box assessment that utilises the same attack methods as real-world threat actors. Our CREST-certified testers will manually attempt to find and exploit vulnerabilities through an unauthenticated and uninformed attacker perspective.

OWASP stands for the Open Web Application Security Project, which is an organisation that sets out best practice guidelines for web application security testing. We deliver web app security testing in line with OWASP frameworks.

Whilst some aspects of web application security testing can be automated, we don’t believe a complete OWASP test can be delivered by relying on automated methods alone. Read more to find out why.

A web app vulnerability scan is an automated method for identifying web app vulnerabilities using scanning tools. A penetration test is a manual approach to web application security testing, which exploits vulnerabilities through an unauthenticated and uninformed attacker perspective to report how a web app could be breached. A scan can only identify that an issue exists; one of the main benefits of a pen test is the ability for a skilled consultant to evaluate the severity of an issue, not just its presence.

Both web app assessments and penetration tests are manual methods of web application security testing, but their approaches are different. In a web app assessment, a tester will be logged into the app, which allows the tester to investigate session and business logic using different user accounts and roles; it is a white-box test. A penetration test is a black-box test. The tester will take on an unauthenticated and uninformed perspective, just like a real-world attacker would, to determine how vulnerabilities could be exploited.

Contact us today for Web Application Security Testing services