Compare
How c/side compares to others
Why we're different
What criteria should I use to evaluate a client-side security solution for PCI compliance?
When you compare security solutions you need to look beyond headline promises and examine how each product capabilities performs against how modern day client-side attacks work and to the operational realities of the business.
Ask how it handles attacks as they really happen. Can it spot new threats the moment they land, understand the payload of the script, and follow its behavior as it changes with the user or the time of day?
Can they show exactly what each third-party script collects and still detect a malicious payload that fires for only 1 in 1,000 visitors, or just 5% of users after 5 p.m.?
Does it remember every action for forensics later, guard live sessions where customers type passwords and card numbers?
Will it catch sneaky DOM tricks, watch exactly the code your visitors run, and use AI to deobfuscate code in real time or will they just use threat feeds where malicious JavaScript can stay undetected for months and years?
If the answer to any of these is no, your security team will be left guessing, let alone prevent a client-side attack from happening. Looking at each of these capabilities up front is the quickest way to know whether a product will protect your customers and your bottom line.
We know that there is a lot of marketing content out there, but the proof is in the pudding. You should always write a malicious script yourself to see whether the solution catches it. If you need us to, we can share one with you too. We'd like for you to use a solution that actually works.
In the scope of PCI, some solutions may have some of the required data scattered around their dashboard. To prevent you from having to keep track of script justifications in a spreadsheet you may want to consider the UI in relation to the PCI requirements.
What are the 4 different approaches in the market today?
| Criteria | Why It Matters | What The Consequences Are | CSP | Crawler | JS-Based | Hybrid Proxy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Real-time Protection | Attacks can occur between scans or in the excluded data when sampled | Delayed detection = active data breaches | ||||
| Full Payload Analysis | Ensures deep visibility into malicious behaviors within script code itself | Threats go unnoticed unless the source is known on a threat feed | ||||
| Dynamic Threat Detection | Identifies attacks that change based on user, time, or location | Missed detection of targeted attacks | ||||
| 100% Historical Tracking & Forensics | Needed for incident response, auditing, and compliance | Avoids trade-offs between performance and security | ||||
| No Performance Impact | Avoids trade-offs between performance and security | Higher page load times can reduce conversions and hurt UX | ||||
| Bypass Protection | Stops attackers from circumventing controls via DOM obfuscation or evasion | Stealthy threats continue undetected | ||||
| Certainty the Script Seen by User is Monitored | Aligns analysis with what actually executes in the browser | Gaps between what's reviewed and what's actually executed | ||||
| AI-driven Script Analysis | Detects novel or evolving threats through behavior modeling | Reliance on manual updates, threat feeds or rules = slow and error-prone detection | ||||
| Implementation Complexity & Timeline | Impacts time-to-value and internal resource costs | Long deployment timelines reduce agility | High | Medium | Medium | Low |
| Can meet 11.6.1 requirement | 11.6.1 relates to monitoring changes in the security headers as well as the script contents themself | Not monitoring security headers violates 11.6.1—missing or altered headers signal potential attacks. |
Additional resources: The differences in client-side security solutions Client-Side Attack Recap
How does c/side compare to other vendors?
c/side |  Cloudflare Page Shield |  Report URI |  Akamai Page Integrity Manager |  Imperva Client Side Protection |  Jscrambler |  Feroot |  Human Security |  Source Defense |  Reflectiz |  DataDome |  Domdog | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Criteria | ||||||||||||
| Approaches used | Proxy + agent based detections but also offers crawler and offers a free CSP reporting endpoint | CSP + fetching script after | CSP + a script to check security headers | JS-Based Detection | CSP | JS-Based Detection | JS-Based Detection | JS-Based Detection | Crawler + JS-Based Detection | Crawler | CSP | JS-Based Detection |
| Real-time Protection | ||||||||||||
| Full Payload Analysis | ||||||||||||
| Dynamic Threat Detection | ||||||||||||
| DOM-Level Threat Detection | ||||||||||||
| 100% Historical Tracking & Forensics | ||||||||||||
| Bypass Protection | ||||||||||||
| Certainty the Script Seen by User is Monitored | ||||||||||||
| AI-driven Script Analysis | ||||||||||||
| QSA validated PCI dash | ||||||||||||
| SOC 2 Type II | ||||||||||||
| PCI specific UI |
You can download our SOC 2 Type II, PCI DSS AOC and Viking Cloud (Mastercard's QSA) report on https://trust.cside.dev/
How we shape up to competitors in detail
Find how c/side compares to the other tools in the market and decide for yourself what your preferred solution is.
Frequently Asked Questions
Everything you need to know about the product.
Why Leading QSAs Prefer c/side
Only c/side delivers
Contact us
Our friendly team would love to hear from you.
