Top 10 UpGuard Alternatives: Which Solution Works Best for You?

Finding the perfect cybersecurity solution can be difficult considering the numerous factors that must be taken into account, such as the industry your organization works in, the number of vendors that are managed, the approved budget to find an adequate security solution, or the specific use cases for your organization.

Chances are that you’re not settling for the first company you come across, which is important so you can compare multiple products together and find the best solution for your organization’s needs.

UpGuard is known for its competitive pricing, end-to-end Vendor Risk Management, intuitive user platform, strong data leak detection services, comprehensive Attack Surface Management, complete risk visibility, and its world-class customer success team serving hundreds of customers worldwide.

However, it ultimately comes down to how your organization decides to utilize the software, which means understanding all the possible alternatives in the same VRM/ASM space.

Scoring Criteria for UpGuard Alternatives

We used a variety of scoring criteria to analyze each UpGuard alternative and viewed them in comparison with other alternatives in the space.

• Capabilities - What are the company’s main features, and how wide is its scope of services?

• Usability and learning curve - Is the platform user-friendly, easy-to-view, and is there a significant learning curve for maximizing its use?

• Community support - Is there enough customer support, guides, and resources along with an in-house team to ensure businesses stay protected?

• Release rate - How often is the product or platform updated and new features added? Does the company announce new updates and features?

• Pricing and support - What pricing model does the company use, and does it scale with business growth?

• API and extensibility - How extensible is the API across multiple areas of need?

• Third-party integrations - Can the platform seamlessly integrate with existing workspace applications?
• Customers - Which high-profile customers does the company support?

• Predictive capabilities - How effectively does the product scan for potential risks, and how are risks mitigated?

• Security ratings - Does the company maintain strong cybersecurity for itself?

Top 10 UpGuard Alternatives

1. BitSight

BitSight Technologies is a security ratings company based in Cambridge, MA, that aims to quantify the external cybersecurity posture of organizations using publicly accessible data. They are seen as one of the first movers in the industry and work primarily in the finance and insurance sectors.

BitSight’s security ratings are used by cyber risk professionals to conduct due diligence research for Vendor Risk Management programs, private equity, M&A activities, and more. Additionally, these security ratings are used for attack surface analytics, industry benchmarking, and the assessment of fourth-party risk.

Pros

• Uniquely monitors for malware, botnets, and patching
• Offers cyber risk quantification and cyber risk rating analysis
• Solidified in the finance and insurance sectors
• Customizable dashboards and reporting features

Cons

• Expensive, non-scalable pricing model
• Slow security scanning (up to 72 hours)
• No data leak detection or monitoring services
• Does not manage vendor risk assessments internally
• Security questionnaires are purchased through a third-party platform
• Poor security ratings (according to UpGuard Security Ratings system)

Pricing

• Public pricing information is not available. Pricing is reported to start at $20,000 plus $2,000-$2,500 per vendor per year.

BitSight vs. UpGuard

BitSight is known as one of the first players in the North American security ratings industry. They are well positioned in the finance and insurance industries due to their ability to provide cyber risk quantification and cyber risk analysis services. BitSight’s strength lies primarily in external attack surface analysis for 1st and 3rd parties, security benchmarking, and executive reporting. However, BitSight is one of the most expensive options on the market, which can be a problem for many SMBs because of the platform’s limited functionality, as the company is solely focused on providing security ratings with no end-to-end vendor risk management service.

UpGuard provides a much more competitively affordable tiered pricing option for all businesses and includes a licensing option to scan unlimited vendors for a single price. All vendor risk assessments and security questionnaires (full library of pre-built and customizable questionnaires) are managed entirely in-house, with the entire process streamlined and automated through UpGuard’s user-friendly platform. Additionally, UpGuard also offers data leak detection in both of its products, BreachSight and Vendor Risk.

For more information, check out our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/bitsight-vs-upguard

2. SecurityScorecard

SecurityScorecard is a New York-based security ratings platform that uses traffic and other publicly accessible data to build security ratings to evaluate vendors and manage cyber risk, among other use cases. SecurityScoreCard also monitors "hacker chatter" and other public data feeds for indicators of compromise.

Pros

• Simple-to-use, intuitive interface
• Wide-ranging dashboard customization options
• Detailed security ratings
• Easily accessible reports
• Free account access
• Consistent new feature release

Cons

• Expensive pricing model
• Too many false positives
• ATLAS (risk assessments and questionnaires) does not integrate with the SSC platform
• Slow security scanning and risk visibility updates (up to one week)
• Security ratings can take 90+ days to update
• Use third-party service to conduct data leak monitoring
• Outsourced third-party risk management services (TPRMS)

Pricing

• Public pricing information is not available. Reports say pricing starts at $16,500 for self-assessment plus five vendors, and additional vendors cost $1,500-$2,000 per vendor per year.

SecurityScorecard vs. UpGuard

SecurityScoreCard is well known in the security ratings industry and primarily markets for enterprise-level accounts, making them one of the most expensive options on the market. They use detailed security ratings and a proprietary methodology to score vendors and even offer free account access to allow customers to trial the product. SecurityScoreCard also has a relatively easy-to-use platform that allows customers to manage everything in one place.

However, one of SecurityScoreCard’s biggest challenges is that the software identifies too many false positives, resulting in inaccurate results, lower scores, and additional time spent by the customer to manually sort through their “ScoreCards.” Additionally, the lack of integration between their risk assessment and questionnaire process makes it difficult for customers to gain a holistic view of their total risk (both internal and external attack surfaces). SecurityScoreCard also outsources its TPRMS and data leak detection services and does not manage those processes in-house.

Comparatively, UpGuard offers fully comprehensive ASM and VRM solutions, with end-to-end managed services for all its customers at a transparent and competitively priced model with different tiers. On top of that, customers can pay a single flat fee to get unlimited vendor scanning, so customers don’t have to worry about burning a vendor license.

The UpGuard platform manages all aspects of the vendor risk and attack surface management process with its in-house team, including in-house verified data leak monitoring processes to minimize the occurrence of false positives, an automated security questionnaire process, and even detailed looks into 4th-party vendors. Everything can be managed in UpGuard’s industry-leading, user-friendly platform for detailed executive reporting and vendor management.

For more information, read our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/securityscorecard-vs-upguard

3. CyberGRX

CyberGRX is based in Denver, Colorado, and provides enterprises and their third parties with a way to improve their approach to third-party cyber risk management. They do this by collecting questionnaire data and cyber risk assessments in a structured format and then sharing them on their information exchange platform to reduce the operational overhead of due diligence programs.

Pros

• Extensive library of vendor questionnaires and risk assessments
• Managed TPRMS and remediation services
• Unlimited licensing available
• Ability to map to specific frameworks
• Monthly release notes

Cons

• High minimum pricing
• No external security monitoring available
• No data leak detection or monitoring services
• Difficult onboarding process

Pricing

• CyberGRX lists typical engagements as starting at around $120,000 USD. This includes validated assessment data and unlimited access to the CyberGRX Exchange.

CyberGRX vs. UpGuard

CyberGRX strictly focuses on the TPRMS side of businesses by taking control of the entire process, from assessments to questionnaires to remediation. In effect, this offering is designed to help save customers time and resources by managing the entire process end-to-end using an extensive library of assessments. They use a similar passive scan as UpGuard to identify all potential risks to the customer and their vendors. However, CyberGRX lists their pricing at an extremely high price, with a $50k minimum for just 100 vendors with no attack surface management solution included. Additional vendors incur additional fees, with the unlimited vendor license likely to come at a premium price.

UpGuard’s pricing model for VRM comes at a much lower and more competitive rate in line with industry standards but also offers BreachSight, the complete ASM solution for 1st and 3rd party security scanning. CyberGRX also does not offer any ASM solutions and partners with other security rating and scanning companies to offer the service, which can result in more fees. Prospective customers should also keep in mind that a managed TPRMS means losing some control over the vendor management process, which can hurt vendor relationships and lose the ability to directly manage remediation processes.

For more information, read our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/cybergrx-vs-upguard

4. RiskRecon

RiskRecon is headquartered in Salt Lake City, UT, with offices in Boston, MA, and representatives around the world. RiskRecon enables users to gain deep, risk-contextualized insight into the cybersecurity risk performance of third parties by continuously monitoring across 11 security domains and 41 security criteria. The platform can be used for third-party risk management, enterprise risk management, and mergers & acquisitions.

Pros

• Fully scans a company’s AWS cloud environment
• Accurate, detailed risk reports
• Well-positioned with IT service providers
• Strong 1st-party risk monitoring

Cons

• Extremely high costs
• Limited executive reporting functionality
• No data leak detection services
• Limited third-party app integrations
• No vendor risk management guidance
• No risk assessment workflow or security questionnaire offerings
• Stagnant growth under MasterCard management

Pricing

• Public pricing information is not available. Pricing is reported to start at $10,000 and increases based on the number of vendors monitored.

RiskRecon vs. UpGuard

RiskRecon and UpGuard both offer VRM/TPRM solutions, however, RiskRecon is primarily positioned as a 1st-party scanning solution and not an end-to-end Vendor Risk Management provider. RiskRecon is considered to have very accurate risk data reports and provides strong actionable insights on identified risks. However, one of RiskRecon’s biggest drawbacks is being stuck as a scanning-only service. RiskRecon does not provide help or guidance in managing vendors and has very limited involvement between third and fourth-party risk management.

What UpGuard accomplishes in this aspect, is full end-to-end managed services to help users build stronger relationships with their vendors, while guiding the VRM lifecycle and not just providing external scanning and continuous monitoring services. UpGuard focuses on ensuring customers are collaborating with their vendors in a comprehensive process to build customer and vendor maturity. Additionally, UpGuard assesses risk across all cloud computing platforms equally, covering more ground in the process.

For more information, check out our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/riskrecon-vs-upguard

5. OneTrust Vendorpedia

OneTrust is a US-incorporated company with primary operating offices based in Atlanta and London. The OneTrust Vendorpedia platform helps users assess and manage cyber risk from third-party vendors in their digital supply chain. The OneTrust Vendorpedia solution leverages security questionnaires and remediation workflows through both an exchange and ad-hoc model to help customers reduce risk and improve due diligence efficiency across vendor relationships.

Pros

• Offers pre-built questionnaires in an automated process
• Easy to integrate with other platforms
• Clean, easy-to-use interface
• Covers global regulatory compliance

Cons

• Too many features with an additional cost for guided implementation
• No external security monitoring available
• No data leak detection or monitoring
• No vendor remediation workflows
• Poor customer service
• Limited reporting functionality

Pricing

• Offers largely transparent pricing for their multiple offerings via their website, with flexible pricing & billing options for small & growing businesses.

OneTrust Vendorpedia vs. UpGuard

OneTrust Vendorpedia is OneTrust’s security questionnaire automation product that directly focuses on building out comprehensive questionnaires for vendors in an automated process while offering actionable insight’s about a vendor’s security controls. They are a fast-growing company with multiple products in the GRC and cloud space. One area of similarity is UpGuard’s and OneTrust’s automated questionnaire process, and both have clean interfaces and dedicated workflows.

Although OneTrust Vendorpedia has a solid automated questionnaire process in place, one area where it lacks is external security monitoring. Currently, OneTrust Vendorpedia does not provide risk scanning and security scoring, which can pose a problem to customers looking to mitigate threats in their vendors. UpGuard has a heavy focus on helping users remediate external third-party risks and has streamlined workflows to assist this process, while also providing security rating services. UpGuard also offers a large library of pre-built, customizable compliance questionnaires with the added bonus of identifying external risks.

For more information, check out our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/onetrust-vs-upguard

6. Panorays

Panorays is a US-incorporated company operating largely in Tel Aviv, Israel. The Panorays platform helps users discover, assess, and monitor their cybersecurity risk exposure from third-party vendors in their digital supply chain. The Panorays platform leverages third-party security ratings, security questionnaires, and remediation workflows to help customers reduce risk through improved due diligence across vendor relationships, mergers & acquisitions, and executive visibility.

Pros

• Offers end-to-end vendor management
• Competitive pricing
• Free account option
• Multi-language support

Cons

• Limited data leak detection capabilities
• No managed services
• Not enough data points
• Slow response times
• Stores data on third-party cloud service

Pricing

• Public-facing pricing is not available. Prospective customers must engage with a Panorays representative to receive pricing quotes for different subscription tiers, with higher tiers allowing for more monitored vendors and customer users.

Panorays vs. UpGuard

Panorays has very similar product offerings as UpGuard, with a few major differences. Panorays incorporates two main products as their core business: external risk monitoring and third-party risk assessments. Much like UpGuard, they also have an intuitive interface that provides end-to-end vendor risk workflow guidance and risk scanning for vendors, all at competitive prices. One of the main differences is that Panorays also offers a free account option to allow prospective customers to try the product before buying and also has multi-language support to enter worldwide markets.

However, Panorays is a newer player in the market and has a few areas where they are less developed than UpGuard, such as data leak monitoring, identity breach detection, typosquatting detection, and visibility into compromised accounts. Scanning a new vendor can also take Panorays up to two days, while UpGuard can assess a vendor in just a matter of hours. Panorays generally offer fewer data points, which can lead to inaccurate scores or incomplete pictures of overall security postures. What might attract more startups and SMBs are the discounted pricing options that Panorays offers, which are typically right before industry standards.

For more information, check out our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/panorays-vs-upguard

7. Recorded Future

Recorded Future is a US-based threat intelligence platform that collects digital threat intelligence data from the Internet, including open source, dark web, technical sources, and original research. Recorded Future’s platform uses machine learning and natural language process AI to deliver accessible intelligence insights across six risk categories: brand, threat, third-party, SecOps, vulnerability, and geopolitical.

Pros

• Offers payment fraud monitoring
• Easily presentable data
• Extensive third-party app integrations, including SIEM, SOAR, and EDR
• Provides real-time data

Cons

• Poor platform interface design, needs fine-tuning
• Expensive costs for limited functionality
• Large volume of email security alerts
• Slow customer support
• No end-to-end vendor risk management

Pricing

• Pricing for Recorded Future’s platform is not available on the website. Online product reviews suggest that it's priced higher than some competitors.

Recorded Future vs. UpGuard

Recorded Future is a very good platform that offers a wealth of information and provides actionable insights about 1st and 3rd-party risks. The highlight is their app integration potential, which can integrate with many other security products, such as SIEM or SOAR. Recorded Future’s predictive capabilities are also in line with industry standards, allowing users to customize their threat intelligence needs. Both UpGuard and Recorded Future have strong continuous monitoring services to track real-time data.

However, Recorded Future has less functionality than UpGuard, which also provides 1st and 3rd-party risk ratings but also includes a full end-to-end VRM process. UpGuard helps businesses manage the entire risk assessment and security questionnaire process, while also ensuring that those businesses are maintaining strong relationships with their vendors.

For more information, read our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/recorded-future-vs-upguard

8. Whistic

Whistic is based in Salt Lake City, Utah, and is primarily focused on providing strong vendor security assessments. Whistic expedites the risk assessment process by making vendor security information available to prospective partners through its Whistic Trust Catalog. Their platform has tools to help you onboard, assess, and track vendors by allowing you to compare third parties against a set of predefined criteria based on vendor questionnaires, documentation, and metadata.

Pros

• Shared catalog of vendor security data
• Easy-to-use interface
• Good customer support

Cons

• Does not provide continuous monitoring
• Relies on point-in-time risk assessments, which may not be entirely accurate between assessment processes
• No end-to-end vendor management
• Unable to export data efficiently
• No internal or external security scanning
• Lack of reporting templates

Pricing

• Reported to start at $25,000 and is based on the number of vendors managed in the platform or the number of security questionnaires to which you're responding.

Whistic vs. UpGuard

Whistic is still fairly new in the VRM field, but they are unique in that they attempt to reduce the number of security questionnaires needed and cut down the time required to conduct a risk assessment by using a shared catalog of vendor security information. Using the catalog, vendors can assess themselves against one of the top vendor questionnaires and publish it to their profile, along with supporting documentation, including audits and certifications. These profiles can be made available to existing and prospective business partners to expedite the risk assessment process.

However, the issue with a shared catalog is that not all vendors create security profiles for themselves, which typically wouldn’t be a problem, but Whistic does not have a managed security questionnaire process. UpGuard removes this problem with its automated, end-to-end vendor management process. Whistic’s current questionnaire management process is cumbersome and non-automated, which creates workflow inefficiencies.

In addition, Whistic currently does not offer a security rating or data leak detection service, which requires customers to find a second solution to cover that area. UpGuard’s platform is an all-in-one TPRM and ASM solution that covers all the bases and provides continuous monitoring.

For more information, check out our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/whistic-vs-upguard

9. Black Kite

Black Kite is a cyber risk rating platform that leverages open-source threat intelligence and non-intrusive cyber reconnaissance to provide information about vendor risk at scale. It collects a wide range of information without touching the target customer by leveraging advances in data science and machine learning to provide higher frequency and precise real-time risk assessments.

Pros

• Offers financial cyber risk quantification
• Similar services as BitSight, but cheaper
• Well-positioned in the government and defense industries
• Provides easy, actionable insights
• Offers ransomware susceptibility ratings

Cons

• Small customer base
• Large volumes of incoming data with no organization in the platform
• Unintuitive and difficult-to-use platform
• Lack of third-party app integrations
• Does not offer security assessment questionnaires
• No end-to-end, automated vendor risk management process

Pricing

• Public pricing information is not available.

Black Kite vs. UpGuard

Black Kite is very similar to BitSight in their financial cyber risk quantification product, but seemingly at a much lower price point. They position themselves as a cyber ratings platform, with TPRMS and continuous monitoring services, despite not having a complete end-to-end solution for managing third-party vendors. Black Kite is heavily focused as a standards-based, ratings-first company. However, Black Kite uses their early entry into the security ratings industry to effectively build a small, loyal customer base.

One of UpGuard’s biggest strengths is one of Black Kite’s biggest weaknesses – a fully automated risk assessment and security questionnaire workflow to help manage vendors throughout the entire process. UpGuard’s team of customer support analysts guides customers throughout the assessment process to quickly gain an overview of vendors and benchmarks them against industry standards and compliance requirements.

UpGuard’s larger customer base from a multitude of industries also allows them to build up a stronger feedback loop, which in turn helps drive the product development cycle, rather than heavily focusing on just a few sectors. Additionally, UpGuard has a transparent pricing model that makes it easier for prospective customers to consider, something that Black Kite does not offer.

For more information, check out our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/blackkite-vs-upguard

10. Prevalent

Prevalent is a Phoenix-based company that provides a 360-degree view of risk by combining vendor risk management, risk assessment, and threat monitoring services. Prevalent's cybersecurity risk rating solution helps organizations manage and monitor the security threats and risks associated with third and fourth-party vendors. Third-party risk management, vendor risk management, data privacy, internal IT & cybersecurity assessment, and vendors use their tools.

Pros

• Great customer support
• Easily accessible reports
• Simple dashboards

Cons

• Unintuitive and complex platform
• Limited security questionnaire customization options
• Limited reporting functionalities
• Lack of third-party app integrations
• Slow feature development cycles
• Security ratings offer little granular information about risks

Pricing

• Public pricing information is not available.

Prevalent vs. UpGuard

Prevalent is a capable third-party risk management service that features strong customer support and a simple user interface as two of its main strengths. They have an automated questionnaire process in place to assist in the vendor risk assessment process and allow easy access to vendor data. However, Prevalent users often run into limited functionalities on the reporting, questionnaire, and data export side that can hinder the ability of businesses to scale quickly. Although Prevalent continues to add new features to the platform, it is clear that the platform is still in its early stages, as features may take a while to develop.

UpGuard consistently develops new features throughout the year based on immediate customer feedback. Along with a dedicated customer success team, the focus is on assisting the client with strong support, integrating seamlessly with company workflows, and making it as easy as possible to learn how to maximize the utility of each new feature. UpGuard is also heavily engaged with the community, producing new blogs, release notes, ebooks, and online webinars to provide customers with a summary of new features and roadmaps for upcoming releases.

For more information, check out our in-depth, side-by-side comparison: https://www.upguard.com/compare/prevalent-vs-upguard

What to Look For in an Effective ASM or VRM Solution

Before you invest in an ASM or VRM solution, look for these features to help guide your decision.

Top VRM Features to Look For

• Third-party attack surface monitoring
• Automated questionnaire processes
• Customizable pre-built security questionnaires based on compliance standards
• Quick scanning of new vendors
• Competitively priced vendor licenses
• Assisted remediation workflows
• Third-party app integration capabilities
• Vendor data leak detection
• Customizable reports for executive management or stakeholders
• Easily scalable VRM programs

Top ASM Features to Look For

• Instant security ratings
• Continuous attack surface monitoring
• Real-time security alerts and reporting
• Third-party app integration capabilities
• Streamlined remediation workflows
• Data leak detection
• Able to detect typosquatted domains
• Minimal false positive alerts

Why You Should Choose UpGuard as Your VRM/ASM/Data Leak Detection Solution

UpGuard is an all-in-one third-party risk and attack surface management platform that helps global businesses monitor their third-party vendors, prevent data breaches, scan for data leaks, and improve their overall security posture. More importantly, UpGuard removes the hassle of having to choose multiple solutions to achieve end-to-end vendor management, 1st, 3rd, and 4th-party security scanning, data leak detection, finding typosquatted domains, executive reporting, and more.

Your organization can save countless hours and manpower by managing all your risks and vendor risks with easy-to-manage, customizable dashboards and generating detailed, executive reports in downloadable form. Now with UpGuard’s managed services, you can save even more time by letting us take care of the heavy lifting by tracking down questionnaires from vendors and ensuring full compliance with regulatory requirements.

With so many different alternatives to choose from, it can be frustrating to find limited functionality in one product and missing features in another. UpGuard operates using feedback from hundreds of customers to create, develop, and implement new features that continue to set the industry standard with one goal in mind: to help make security easy and headache-free.

Find out why UpGuard was named a leader in G2’s Winter 2023 survey of Third-Party & Supplier Risk Management Software, and sign up for a free trial today!