Source Defense vs Akamai Client-Side Protection
Client-Side Protection & Compliance at a lower cost with near-zero maintenance.
Akamai Is Reactive. Source Defense Prevents.
Akamai relies on manual, after-the-fact controls. Teams must detect an issue, configure policies, and test changes while exposure continues. Scripts are not isolated, so third- and fourth-party code can still interact with the page.
Visibility is also limited. Scripts are grouped by vendor, not behavior, and not by payment page. That makes it difficult to understand risk or support PCI DSS 4.0.1 client-side requirements with confidence.
Source Defense takes a prevention-first approach.
Protection is enforced automatically and continuously. Malicious JavaScript behavior is blocked the moment it occurs, including keylogging, formjacking, and unauthorized DOM access.
Scripts are automatically inventoried and classified across all pages, with payment-page-specific visibility and reporting to support PCI DSS 4.0 requirements without manual effort.
Built exclusively for eSkimming and client-side security.
Source Defense has focused on stopping malicious JavaScript for over a decade. eSkimming protection is not an add-on. It is the platform. Trusted by global merchants and assessors. Independent reviews by CoalFire, VikingCloud, and Verizon confirm that Source Defense meets PCI DSS 4.0.1 requirements 6.4.3 and 11.6.1.
Make scripts safe – automatically.
See browser side risks in real time and give your team the evidence auditors expect.
| Source Defense Advantage | What Akamai Misses |
|---|---|
| Easy-to-use PCI dashboard and ability to view all data and views relevant for payment pages only | Provides site-wide views, making it especially difficult to manage and generate evidence for payment-page-specific information |
| Automatically enforced policies continuously, informed by over a decade of eSkimming and client-side focus and ongoing threat research | Protection is reactive, not proactive; typically requiring manual policy selection, application, and validation to address newly observed issues. |
| Auto-grouping of script files as services for easy management and identification of new behavior, ensuring integrity per service | Each script file is managed individually, making it difficult to manage and differentiate between behaviors of different services from the same vendor |
| Script isolation is supported, providing a higher layer of protection without entirely blocking scripts | Script isolation (sandboxing) is not supported |
| Simple deployment, not dependent on other client-side solutions in place | Dependent on other Akamai products for straightforward deployment, which can make implementation difficult if not bought as a bundle |
Changes landed saily via our tag manager, spawing fourth-party calls we could neither inventory nor police. The browser was effectively a blind spot: we had no automated way to see which scripts were running, what data they touched, or where they sent it.
A Holistic Approach to Protecting Credit Card Payment Flows
Protection of Sensitive Data Using the Source Defense Platform.
Source Defense Protect: Behavior Based Application Defense
Learn how Source Defense’s approach to behavioral based defense can help you!
Since introducing the first behavior-based client-side protection platform in 2016, Source Defense has continued to safeguard the global payments ecosystem from data theft, privacy violations, and compliance failures. Source Defense started with protecting the browser.
Most web security platforms stop at the network perimeter. But 97% of websites now rely on third-party scripts running in the browser, the exact layer where eSkimming and compliance violations occur. Source Defense closes that gap with continuous monitoring, policy control, and PCI-ready evidence.
About Source Defense
As a PCI Participating Organization and pioneer in eSkimming security, Source Defense helped shape the PCI DSS 4.0 web security standards. Our platform protects global merchants and QSAs, delivering real-time browser-side protection and compliance automation.