Akamai Page Integrity Manager vs c/side. Which is better?
You’re on the c/side website, so we’re going to be a tad biased. Nevertheless, we’ll make our case.
To further your research, here’s the Akamai Page Integrity Manager product page.
First the differences in a table, below in more detail.
The differences between Akamai Page Integrity Manager and c/side
| c/side | Akamai Page Integrity Manager | |
|---|---|---|
| Client side JS script detection | ✅ | ✅ |
| Uses threat feed intel | ✅ | ✅ |
| Monitors Who-is records | ✅ | ✅ |
| Monitors SSL | ✅ | |
| Able to detect inline scripts | ✅ | |
| Uses AI to analyze scripts | ✅ | |
| Can autonomously block malicious scripts | ✅ | |
| Proxies scripts | ✅ | |
| Stores script content for future review | ✅ | |
| Has 100% certainty that the script reviewed is the one seen by the browser of the user | ✅ | |
| Performance enhances scripts | ✅ |
What we don’t like about Akamai Page Integrity Manager
In a similar story to most competitors, Akamai’s Page Integrity Manager is mainly able to list, allow, and block scripts based on previous intel and known issues. They offer great visibility of the script sources, but no insight into the actual payload of a script. This means they can't block scripts in real-time, before needing confirmation after alerting you.
They boast behavioral detection technology, similar to c/side. Both tools monitor the script in real-time and check the script's behavior. When something is up, Akamai will alert. c/side will alert and block it (depending on the situation).
On Akamai's Page Integrity Manager page PDF, they mention this under Mitigation: Malicious JavaScript is immediately restricted from accessing and exfiltrating sensitive data on protected pages with one easy click. What that 'easy click' is, we don't know. Presumably, they alert you right when their software notices an issue, and send you urgent requests to check and block the script manually. This is after the damage is done. c/side does not require this final step.
Similar to us, Akamai offers a free tier for Page Integrity Manager, but only as an add-on. You also have to already be an Akamai customer, and are limited to 1M Beacons/page views per month, which means you’ll end up paying a pretty penny. It’s also limited to a single domain and up to 5 pages. It’s basically only meant for your most important pages, which likely are payment pages.
At this time, it doesn’t seem like they offer a self-serve option, you have to get in touch with their sales team to try it out.
More about c/side
c/side allows you to monitor and set rules to your heart’s content, but we also have the capability to take action at the exact moment something is about to go wrong. The main way we do that is by wrapping your scripts in a proxy. Which shields off scripts totally, and even allows your site to run faster (in most cases) because of caching.
We also store every version of the script’s content for feature review and to update our detection mechanisms, a mix of our AI and LLM that is continuously updated.
Your choice!
So there you have it, our understanding and thoughts on how Akamai’s Page Integrity Manager and c/side shape up. Have we made our case or are you still looking for some more information?
Hop on our free tier, and take it for a spin.
Get started with c/side.
Or, you can go here to read more on how c/side works and find other comparisons.