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8 PCI Compliance Test, Scan, and Audit Tools That Help Secure Your Infrastructure

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8 PCI Compliance Test, Scan, and Audit Tools That Help Secure Your Infrastructure
Author: DuploCloud | Monday, March 6 2023
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A round-up of resources to achieve and maintain PCI compliance

The road to complying with the Payment Card Industry (PCI) standards can have many twists and turns. For one, there is no such thing as a one-and-done compliance process. If you accept, process, or store credit card data, you must continually prove that your systems are secure. The rules for compliance also differ depending on the volume of transactions you process, so the steps you may need to take may change as your business grows. 

It’s perhaps not surprising then that there are a number of PCI compliance test tools on the market to help you prepare and maintain payment security protocols.  Below is a round-up of seven of the most useful ones, plus some tips to help you build-in security from the get-go. 

Need to brush up on the basics of PCI Compliance? Check out The Complete Guide to PCI Compliance.

Compliance From Day One

The easiest way to ensure your systems are PCI compliant is to start with built-in security protocols. Making security a part of your workflow from the beginning, when making adjustments is still simple, is a much more efficient process than building an entire product, auditing it for security standards, and then having to go back and tear down some of your hard work. Aside from being frustrating to your team, this “security-last” approach can delay your time to market and make investors impatient. 

Out-of-the-box compliance solutions are a way to get a jump on the complexities of PCI compliance with built-in standards. DuploCloud’s DevSecOps automation platform lets your team work with an environment designed for PCI compliance, which means you’ll be able to meet 90% of the required standards before the development cycle is complete. If you want to learn more about PCI compliance with DuploCloud, give this whitepaper a read.

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8 Best PCI Compliance Test Tools

OSSEC

An open source free intrusion detection system (IDS), OSSEC is widely used by IT teams across industries to run PCI compliance tests. The scanning solution comes with a centralized management server to help you oversee policies across multiple operating systems. Once downloaded, OSSEC actively monitors and analyzes your log activity to detect rootkits and malicious applications. If an intrusion is detected, OSSEC will respond to the threat in real-time through integration with your security policies. 

Companies that need to comply with PCI standards can use OSSEC to cover requirements 10 and 11 (file integrity monitoring, log inspection and monitoring, and policy enforcement/checking). 

Snort

Snort is another open-source IDS that can be used as a PCI compliance scan tool for Windows and Linux systems. It works similarly to OSSEC in that it can analyze log data and send alerts if suspicious activity is detected. It can also function as a packet sniffing tool, examining streams of data traffic as they flow between devices on your network and between your devices and the internet. 

There is a free version of Snort, though there are paid versions with additional features, like priority response for false positives and rules. Users can find complete documentation and rulesets on the Snort website. One of the biggest benefits of Snort is its thriving user community, with mail lists, opportunities to contribute code, and submission of bug reports all contributing to the collaborative environment.

1Stop PCI Scan from Backbone Security

With 20 years of experience under its belt, Backbone Security’s 1Stop PCI Scan solution is widely used for PCI compliance tests and certified as an Approved Scanning Vendor by PCI. To remain compliant, all organizations need to perform a quarterly system scan, and 1Stop provides just that, plus remediation consultations and a host of helpful add-ons, like self-scheduled scanning. 

1Stop PCI Scan also conducts annual system penetration testing — they will conduct a simulation of an attack on your system and see how it holds up — which is a sub-requirement in criteria 11 of PCI DSS 3.2. After conducting the test, 1Stop will provide you with a detailed report and remediation plan if system vulnerabilities are detected. 

LogicManager

LogicManager offers a suite of PCI compliance scan tools, including One-Click Compliance, which uses an AI-powered search to sift through your entire library of existing IT protocols. That means your team won’t need to scroll through hundreds of documentation pages when you’re preparing for an audit. 

You also get access to a central hub where you can view common controls, delegate remediation tasks, and track your PCI compliance. Because staying compliant is an ongoing process, LogicManager also offers reporting tools that track control deficiencies, show a full history of compliance with the 12 requirements, and provide readiness summaries. In other words, LogicManager is a fairly comprehensive all-in-one tool that both prepares you for a PCI compliance audit and helps you maintain required standards. 

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)

SolarWinds SEM uses log data and built-in PCI DSS rules to detect vulnerabilities across your entire IT infrastructure. Among its many applications, it can be used as a PCI compliance scanner tool. Users can schedule automatic reports (with built-in compliance controls) weeks or months in advance, making planning for audits easier. SolarWinds SEM also includes maintenance features, like file integrity monitoring (FIM) templates to help your team test security measures in key files. 

This tool goes beyond assisting your team with remediation efforts by providing you with documentation you can use to complete a self-assessment questionnaire or share with a PCI QSA during an audit. A 30-day free trial is available.                                                                                                                                                                                              

Nagios Network Analyzer

Nagios Network Analyzer helps conduct PCI compliance scans through extensive network monitoring. It comes with a comprehensive dashboard where your team can quickly get a bird’s eye view of your network security. Nagios also provides you with visualization tools, which makes it easy to generate reports for an upcoming audit or to bolster your current documentation. 

Nagios will automatically alert your team if abnormal activity takes place or if bandwidth usage exceeds specified thresholds. Nagios offers a free 30-day trial, after which you’ll need to purchase a license key.

Secureframe

Secureframe specializes in streamlining and automating compliance and also offers PCI compliance training. It supports both Level 1 companies that are going through an audit as well as Level 2 and 3 companies that need to complete a self-assessment questionnaire. If you’re not sure which level you are, Secureframe’s team can help you decide and guide you through over 300 PCI DSS compliance sub-requirements. 

Once you achieve compliance, Secureframe can help you maintain it with a cloud services monitoring feature, which integrates with the rest of your tech stack. It’s a one-stop solution for PCI compliance, great for teams who don’t have time or resources to cobble together various tools to achieve compliance. 

Strike Graph 

StrikeGraph can help your business achieve compliance with several standards, including PCI DSS, SOC 2, and GDPR. The process for PCI DSS compliance begins with a risk assessment conducted through StrikeGraph’s platform, after which you’ll receive a gap analysis and the corresponding tools needed for remediation. All of this can be viewed from a single compliance dashboard. StrikeGraph can also connect your business with an approved PCI assessor and scale your solutions as your business grows.

Getting it right the first time

Continuously scanning for PCI compliance is invaluable, though if you didn’t implement the right PCI protocols at the very beginning, you may find yourself working backward a lot. Building a product in the cloud without implementing security protocols from the start is a bit like building a house without a plan. Meanwhile using DuploCloud’s DevSecOps-as-a-Service platform is like building a home with a solid blueprint in hand. Besides the built-in PCI DSS protocols, DuploCloud’s DevSecOps platform provides you with reporting and cloud remediation services to strengthen an existing security structure, making sure preventable security incidents don’t slip through the cracks. Schedule a demo with our team to learn more.

Author: DuploCloud | Monday, March 6 2023
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