CVE Scan by The Embedded Kit
CVE Scan is a commercial software composition analysis tool developed by The Embedded Kit. It is supplied with its complete source code, providing engineering teams with full flexibility for system maintenance and security purposes.
This Linux vulnerability scanner seamlessly integrates into Yocto build processes. It incorporates a dedicated meta-layer for comprehensive Software Bill of Materials (SBOM) generation, utilizing external sources for periodic CVE and kernel patch updates.
With this precise SBOM, CVE Scan generates a list of Linux vulnerabilities specific to the system analyzed through conservative CVE retrieval, meticulous attention granted to kernel components, and advanced CVE filtering. Notably, CVE Scan allows the application of developer-provided annotations to rule out additional CVEs, ensuring a clean status against state-of-the-art vulnerabilities.
These advanced CVE filtering and annotation capabilities help to reduce widely false positives compared to other tools.
In summary, CVE Scan stands as a robust solution for the efficient security maintenance of embedded Linux systems. Its strengths lie in its high accuracy and the control it provides to software teams over the management of their vulnerabilities.
cve-check by The Yocto Project
cve-check is a class from the Yocto Project. It follows an open-source philosophy, making it freely available for users. While it offers a cost-effective alternative for users seeking a budget-friendly vulnerability analysis tool, its limitations prevent it from being sufficiently advanced to effectively secure embedded Linux systems.
Indeed, in terms of accuracy, cve-check focuses mainly on matching package names and versions. It effectively detects Yocto patches but overlooks kernel configuration, potentially limiting its scope in certain scenarios. While the basic level of accuracy may suffice for essential vulnerability identification, it might fall short compared to tools with more advanced algorithms and provide a lot of false positives in CVE listing results.
In comparison with CVE Scan, CVE check doesn’t offer any manual annotation capability. This limitation may require users to invest additional effort in manual validation and annotation tasks, even more so as the results often present false positives.
In summary, despite its open-source advantages, the basic level of automated analysis accuracy and the lack of manual analysis capabilities may be considered limitations for users seeking to optimize their vulnerability detection and resolution activities.
Vigiles by Timesys
Vigiles is a SaaS software composition analysis tool developed by Timesys.
Like CVE Scan, Vigiles generates a SBOM, matching package names and versions, detecting Yocto patches, and considering kernel fix commits to help maintenance teams ensure comprehensive vulnerability analysis of their embedded Linux systems. Vigiles also introduces whitelisting options for flexibility in manual validation and proposes a user-friendly interface for vulnerabilities management.
However, falling under the SaaS model limits user control over their vulnerabilities and the ability to access the underlying code for adaptation to specific needs.
In summary, Vigiles is a solid solution for vulnerability analysis and monitoring in embedded Linux systems. However, users must weigh these advanced capabilities against the limitations of reduced control over the tool and its results.
Black Duck SCA by Synopsys
Black Duck SCA is a SaaS CVE scanner developed by Synopsys.
Leveraging an extensive CVE knowledge base and multifactor open-source detection, Black Duck provides insights into the composition of applications and containers. The CVE scanner facilitates dependency, code print, binary, and snippet analysis. Like other tools, you can integrate Black Duck SCA into your CI pipelines to automate CVE detection.
Black Duck uses the binary image of your Linux system to detect CVEs. It generally detects package versions correctly, allowing for accurate detection of the corresponding vulnerabilities. However, it may sometimes be unable to determine the package version. In such cases, the user will need to manually enter the version to avoid false positives.
Despite this, the tool exhibits limitations in CVE analysis for embedded systems by excluding Yocto whitelists and patches, leading to numerous false positives.
In conclusion, Black Duck is a good vulnerability detection tool, although it requires manual verification work to filter out false positives.
Selecting the appropriate CVE scanner for embedded Linux systems hinges on several considerations starting with the accuracy of vulnerability analysis, but also budgetary constraints, and preferences regarding ownership.
Both CVE Scan and Vigiles emerge as top contenders for comprehensive vulnerability management in embedded Linux environments. While they may yield similar accuracy in results, their distinction lies in their offered business models (SaaS vs source code).
Note that CVE Scan offers a free trial version for your evaluation.
