A Developer’s Guide to Pentest Terminology and Metrics | Cobalt

Cobalt Platform AI-powered offensive security platform for continuous risk mitigation. Integrations Automate workflows to remediate vulnerabilities faster. Artificial Intelligence Cobalt Sage AI is the intelligence that powers every pentest. Pricing Explore the flexible Cobalt credit model that scales to your needs. Agentic PTaaS Human-led, AI-powered pentesting that scales with your attack surface. DAST Continuously monitor web applications and APIs for vulnerabilities.

Secure every application with flexible pentesting that combines expert-led testing, autonomous validation, and actionable results.

Autonomous Pentest Fast, autonomous pentests for every release and every new threat. AI & LLM Pentest Targeted testing to protect your AI systems and models. Web Application Pentest Ensure your mission-critical applications are secure. API Pentest Identify exploits for endpoints and microservices.

Offensive Security Program Go beyond one-off pentests with continuous testing, fix validation, and strategic guidance. Continuous Pentesting Program Go beyond on-demand pentests with a continuous pentesting program. Enterprise Consolidate pentesting into a centrally managed, continuous program that scales with your business. Compliance Meet ever-evolving governance, risk, and compliance requirements with expert-led pentesting. Small Business Comprehensive pentesting to meet compliance requirements. Secure SDLC Embed proactive security practices across the entire software development lifecycle.

Resource Library Essential reading and toolkits for modern cybersecurity professionals. Blog Sharpen your skills with expert commentary and practical security advice. Demo Center Explore the features, insights, and automation that help teams deliver high-impact pentests. Customer Stories Learn how real customers benefit from the Cobalt Offensive Security Platform. Webinars & Events Live and on-demand events and training for today's most pressing security challenges. Learning Center Learn the fundamentals of offensive security and strengthen your cyber defenses. Partners Explore the Cobalt partnership network and apply to become a partner today. Newsroom Read the latest news stories and press coverage.

About Us Learn how Cobalt infuses manual security testing with speed, simplicity, and transparency. Contact Us Get in touch with a member of our team. Leadership Meet the executive leadership team driving our mission. Cobalt Core Meet the community of skilled and highly vetted pentesting experts. Careers Join Cobalt to help us redefine and reimagine offensive security. Become a Pentester Apply to join our elite community of freelance pentesters.

Whether it’s for compliance, stronger security, or testing specific app features, pentests are a common part of the security testing mix. But there’s a problem: pentest reports are rarely intuitive to Dev teams, in large part because of excessive jargon.

The ideal scenario is to share with developers pentest findings that are clear, structured, and easy to replicate. If your team has to deal with a cryptic pentest report, Nick Terkay — Senior Director of Engineering, CX — has prepared a short guide on the most common pentest terms and metrics, and how to use them to improve the quality of your code.