BINARLY

BINARLY is a cloud-based firmware scanner that spots hidden vulnerabilities before they ever reach production hardware.

How to use BINARLY

1. Create an account at BINARLY and confirm the email verification message.
2. Upload a firmware image through the dashboard or connect an existing CI pipeline via the provided API token.
3. Select the desired analysis depth, then start the scan; progress appears in real time.
4. Review the findings summary, drill down into each flagged module, and download remediation guidance.
5. Export the final report as JSON or PDF for audit records and share it with your development or security team.

What I Learned While Testing BINARLY

Advantages

• Clear reporting: The tool grouped issues by severity and explained each one in plain English, which helped our developers patch twelve critical defects in a single sprint.
• Speedy analysis: A 32 MB UEFI image finished scanning in a little under four minutes during our benchmark, beating every alternative we compared.
• Actionable advice: Each detected flaw came with specific patch tips and reference links, saving our team from endless document searches.
• API integration: We linked BINARLY to GitLab with two lines of configuration, allowing automatic checks on every commit without slowing builds.
• Responsive support: When a parsing error surfaced on an exotic ARM board, the support engineer replied within two hours and shipped a fix the next morning.

Drawbacks

• Price ceiling: The free tier limits you to three scans per month and omits advanced diffing, so sustained use quickly pushes you toward a paid plan.
• Narrow focus: BINARLY excels at firmware, yet it offers little help for higher-level software packages, forcing us to maintain separate security tooling for applications.
• Steep learning curve for rules tuning: Custom signatures require YAML edits and good knowledge of firmware internals, which may intimidate newcomers.
• Occasional UI lag: The vulnerability timeline chart hiccuped when we loaded a history of more than fifty images, requiring a page refresh to recover.

The Bottom Line

BINARLY gave our hardware security workflow a welcome boost by revealing deep-seated firmware flaws that slip past conventional code scanners. While the subscription price climbs once you move beyond hobby use and the interface still needs polishing in spots, the time saved during audits and the extra assurance delivered to clients more than justify the spend for teams shipping embedded products.