The right choice of Third-party risk assessment software will automate risk assessment workflows and boost the efficiency of your Third-Party Risk Management program. This post reviews the top eight contenders in the TPRM and supply chain risk management market to help you make the right choice for your third-party cybersecurity objectives.
Top 3 metrics of an ideal third-party risk assessment solution
With so many TPRM platforms available and each option dovetailing into multiple risk assessment features, it’s easy to get overwhelmed when shortlisting your solution options. In an attempt to finally provide some clarity and direction to your shortlisting efforts, this post ranks all eight third-party risk assessment software options on three performance metrics that are the most critical to the success of a TPRM program.
- Scalability - The third-party risk assessment software must offer automation features supporting rapid scalability.
- Use friendliness - A streamlined user experience reduces learning curves, expediting implementation times and, ultimately, a return on investment.
- TPRM lifecycle scope - As third-party risk assessment processes map to all stages of TPRM, an idealistic solution should be capable of supporting the entire TPRM lifecycle to reduce the need for integrating multple third-party solutions.
The top 8 third-party risk assessment software tools in 2024
All of the options in this list offer third-party risk assessment software tools as part of a Third-Party Risk Management solution (TPRM solution). A solution just supporting third-party risk assessment features is exceptionally rare, given the deep, unavoidable integrations across third-party risk assessments and TPRM workflows. If you happen to come across a platform just focusing on vendor risk assessments, it’s best to steer clear of it, as it clearly falls short of the TPRM lifecycle scope metric characterizing an idealistic third-party risk assessment tool.
For more information about how risk assessment workflows fit into a broader TPRM program, read this post about implementing a vendor risk assessment process.
1. UpGuard
Ideal for businesses looking for a cost-effective all-in-one TPRM solution.
UpGuard’s performance across the top three third-party risk assessment solution metrics
Below is an overview of how UpGuard performs against the key risk assessment features of an ideal TPRM tool.
Scalability
UpGuard offers a suite of automation features addressing the process bottlenecks commonly responsible for delayed risk assessments, including:
- Third-Party vendor collaborations - All parties involved in risk assessment completions can collaborate directly on the platform, removing the risk of critical communications getting lost in emails.
- Questionnaire responses - By leveraging AI technology, UpGuard allows users to improve both the quality and speed of their questionnaire responses.
- Repetitive questionnaires - By referencing a central database of previously completed questionnaires, UpGuard empowers users to repeat lengthy, repetitive questionnaire items with just a single, allowing third-party risk assessments to be completed in hours instead of weeks.
Watch this video for an overview of some of UpGuard’s third-party risk assessment automation features.
User Friendliness
The UpGuard platform is extremely easy to navigate. Its workflows have been intentionally designed to be as intuitive as possible to TPRM personnel. Thanks to its shallow learning curve, UpGuard users almost instantly experience a return on their TPRM investment.
“We found UpGuard’s design very clean and very intuitive – more intuitive than the UI of its competitors, making it an easy decision to go with UpGuard.”
- 7 Chord
TPRM Lifecycle Scope
The UpGuard platform is one of the few options truly offering an all-in-one TPRM solution. Every aspect of the TPRM lifecycle is addressed on the UpGuard platform to the highest possible standard, including:
- Due diligence - UpGuard’s Trust Exchnage platform allows service providers to easiily share all relevant information security and regulatory compliance data with partners, expediting the discovery of supplier risks, and supporting secure vendor onboarding.
- Compliance management - With its natively integrated risk assessment workflow, UpGuard can instantly discover compliance risks mapping to popular standards, such as HIPAA, GDPR, and PCI DSS).
- Risk assessments - UpGuard’s comprehensive questionnaire library offers customizable templates for investiagting even the most unique cyber risk, as well as templates mapping to popular cybersecurity frameworks, such as NIST CSF, and ISO 27001.
- Continuous monitoring - By combining the deep insights of point-in-time risk assessment with real-time security rating calculations, UpGuard offers complete monitoring of the entire attack surface, including risks mapping from fourth-party vendors.
- Offboarding - With its attack surface monitoring module, UpGuard helps security teams accurately map their digital footprint to track all existing connections with third-party internet-facing assets, and any overlooked connections from expiring third-party vendor partnerships.
Watch this video for an overview of some of the third-party risk assessment features available on the UpGuard platform.
2. Security Scorecard
Ideal for companies wanting a scalable and user-friendly platform with less emphasis on asset inventory discovery.
SecurityScorecard’s performance across the top three third-party risk assessment solution metrics
Below is an overview of how SecurityScorecard performs against the key risk assessment features of an ideal TPRM tool.
Scalability
SecurityScorecard is designed to decrease cyber risk in organizational IT infrastructure and third-party ecosystems by providing meaningful and actionable insights. The platform's scalability allows it to handle extensive networks of third-party vendors effectively, ensuring robust risk management as organizations expand.
However, SecurityScorecard takes about ten days to update its third-party vendor attack surface scanning data, which could produce misleading vendor risk profiles to users during this slow refresh period. As a benchmark for how quickly security rating data could be refreshed, UpGuard updated its third-party relationship cyber risk data every 24 hours, offering users the most up-to-date visibility of their third-party attack surface.
See how SecurityScorecard compares to UpGuard >
User Friendliness
While SecurityScorecard is praised for its ease of use, there are some challenges with its interface. Some categories can be overly aggressive in scoring, and certain integrations may not function optimally, which can limit the user experience and require more effort to manage effectively
TPRM Lifecycle Scope
SecurityScorecard supports the entire third-party risk management lifecycle but has areas needing improvement. Specifically, the product does not always identify all internet-facing assets, which can leave gaps in the risk assessment process and potentially expose an organization to unseen vulnerabilities.
3. Bitsight
Ideal for organizations needing comprehensive cyber risk insights but can tolerate delays in updating risk reports.
Bitsight’s performance across the top three third-party risk assessment solution metrics
Below is an overview of how Bitsight performs against the key risk assessment features of an ideal TPRM tool.
Scalability
Bitsight has had ongoing issues of not refreshing risks addressed in third-party risk assessment efforts fast enough, with many users complaining of needing to wait about sixty days before third-party risk reports are updated. Sixty days is an excessive delay for a risk management platform, especially when compared with UpGuard’s third-party risk management software, which refreshes its third-party risk scanning data every 24 hours.
Without real-time awareness of the actual state of an organization’s attack surface, users will have issues safely scaling their TPRM program with the platform.
See how Bitsight compares to UpGuard >
User Friendliness
Bitsight offers a intuitive and user-friendly dashboard with features that are easily to naviagte between. However, with some users complaining of the platform’s questionnable third-party risk data accuracy, the frustrations of allocating Vendor Risk Management (VRM) resources based on faulty intelligence will likely quickly cloud any usability benefits.
TPRM Lifecycle Scope
Bitsight’s third-party risk assessment workflows are not natively integrated into the platform. In order to establish a complete risk assessment workflow, Bitsight needed to aquire the TPRM ThirdPartyTrust (TPT). This has essentially resulted in a separation between third-party monitoring and third-party risk assessment processes, which could be detrimental to user workflows and TPRM program scalability.
4. OneTrust
Ideal for enterprises looking for robust automation in vendor risk assessments with some tolerance for a steep learning curve.
OneTrust’s performance across the top three third-party risk assessment solution metrics
Below is an overview of how OneTrust performs against the key risk assessment features of an ideal TPRM tool.
Learn how UpGuard compares with OneTrust >
Scalability
OneTrust is noted for its scalability thanks to its automation features streamlining user workflows. However, its learning curve can be quite steep, especially when tailoring the platform to specific TPRM contexts.
User Friendliness
OneTrust generally recieves positive user feedback about the user-friendly nature of its design, despite some difficult in locating specfic feature locations.
TPRM Lifecycle Scope
Users have reported some disjointed TPRM workflows in the OneTrust platform, particularly across its third-party risk exchange hub and other third-party risk administration.
5. Prevalent
Ideal for businesses needing quick vendor onboarding and extensive customization options.
Prevalent’s performance across the top three third-party risk assessment solution metrics
Below is an overview of how Prevalent performs against the key risk assessment features of an ideal TPRM tool.
Learn how UpGuard compares with Prevalent >
Scalability
Prevalent supports quick implementationd and new vendor onboaridng, setting a foundation for a scalable third-party risk management tool. However, the company seems to be more focused on including additional product features, rather than addressing exisitng issues limiing the scalability of the product.
User Friendliness
Prevalent generally receives positive feedback for its user-friendly interface. However, achieving mastery of its suite of features is reportedly cumbersome, further highlighting the company’s disproportionate focus on implementing new features over addressing existing user issues.
TPRM Lifecycle Scope
Prevalent supports the entire third-party risk management lifecycle but, like Bitsight and SecurityScorecard, struggles with refreshing remediation tasks in its risk reporting. The platform’s vast customization options allows it to be adapted to many TPRM contexts, which could potentially support a wide scope of TPRM workflows.
6. Panorays
Ideal for firms requiring detailed security insights and easy-to-use collaborative tools.
Panorays’s performance across the top three third-party risk assessment solution metrics
Below is an overview of how Panorays performs against the key risk assessment features of an ideal TPRM tool.
Learn how UpGuard compares with Panorays >
Scalability
Panorays overall support fast implementation, however it could take up to 48 hours for newly imported third-party vendors to be scanned and included in reporting data, which could delay inherent risk discovery during the vendor onboarding stage of the vendor lifecycle. Some users have also reported service disruptions, which could result in unreliable third-party risk intelligence that isn’t conducive to scaling.
User Friendliness
Panorays to designed with a user-friendly interface that can be easily understood by all levels of users, even stakeholders.
TPRM Lifecycle Scope
Panorays supports end-to-end Third-Party Risk Management workflows, allowing risk assessment workflows to naturally integrate with Third-Party Risk Management processes. However, some of the capabilities of these surrounding features, as well as those directing supporting risk assessment processes, are questionable.
7. RiskRecon
Ideal for companies needing straightforward, comprehensive security assessment tools with continuous monitoring despite some integration and asset identification issues.
RiskRecon’s performance across the top three third-party risk assessment solution metrics
Below is an overview of how RiskRecon performs against the key risk assessment features of an ideal TPRM tool.
Learn how UpGuard compares with RiskRecon >
Scalability
RiskRecon offers risk scoring features, such as its Criticality Matrix, helping security teams gain insights insights about the state of their third-party risk mitigation efforts. This advanced awarenss supports agile risk assessment responses, and ultimatily a scallable TPRM program. Although, some users have flagged intergartion isuses which may impede scalabaility across a larger body of TPRM solutions.
The platform has also been flagged for inaccurate asset discovery, which could result in inefficient resource allocation while scaling third-party risk assessment processes.
User Friendliness
RiskRecon generally receives positive reviews about its usability as a third-party risk assessment and TPRM solution.
TPRM Lifecycle Scope
RiskRecon does not offer a natively integrated third-party risk assessment workflow. The company has partnered with Whistic to fill this concerning feature gap for a TPRM solution.
8. Black Kite
Ideal for businesses wanting fast implementation and less emphasis on security questionnaires in third-party risk management.
Black Kite’s performance across the top three third-party risk assessment solution metrics
Below is an overview of how Black Kite performs against the key risk assessment features of an ideal TPRM tool.
Learn how UpGuard compares with Black Kite >
Scalability
Black Kite supports fast implementation, making it suitable for businesses scaling their third-party due diligence efforts. The platform’s limitation in its intergration capabilties could cause issues for expanding third-party vendor and third-party risk managed services.
An area of considerable concern is Black Kite’s lack of a complete risk assessment workflow. To supplement the workflow gaps that come standard in many of the other Vendor Risk Management software options in this list, users need to either perform manual work or integrate the platform with other Vendor Risk Management solutions, resulting in not only an excessive TPRM investment but also, an excessively bloated digital footprint, a result that’s detrimental to the tool’s data breach prevention objectives,
User Friendliness
The Black Kite platform is easy to navigate with its intuitive workflows. Despite its user-friendly dashboard, the platform’s processes may take a while to load, which, over time, could cause a frustrating user experience.
TPRM Lifecycle Scope
Black Kite does not offer an end-to-end third-party risk assessment program. To achieve a complete risk assessment tool, users would need to either supplement process gaps with manual work or integrate the platform with other solutions, resulting in excessively high costs for a TPRM solution.
