1
2 Comments

What building a browser extension taught us about real web attacks

We started Nautillo as a browser extension to see how security issues appear during normal browsing.

We learned this fast.
Tools scan in isolation.
Attackers chain small weaknesses step by step.

So Nautillo is evolving.
From one extension to attack focused security.
Extensions for early signals.
A SaaS product that simulates real web attack paths.

Question.
How do you validate real security risk today without enterprise tools or noisy scanners?

on January 29, 2026
  1. 1

    Really interesting pivot from extension to SaaS. The attack path simulation angle is smart — most tools just throw a list of CVEs at you without context.

    To your question: I've been validating JSON payloads lately and the amount of sketchy data that passes through APIs is wild. Simple stuff like checking for script injection in JSON fields catches more issues than you'd think.

    Curious — does Nautillo work with API traffic too, or mainly browser-based attacks?

  2. 1

    The "chain small weaknesses" insight is the key differentiator here. Most security tools treat vulnerabilities as isolated findings — "you have XSS here, SQL injection there" — without showing how an attacker would actually combine them into a kill chain.

    To your question about validating security risk without enterprise tools:

    For small teams, I've seen a few approaches work:

    1. Threat modeling first — Before scanning anything, map out "what would an attacker actually want from this system?" That filters signal from noise better than any tool.

    2. Bug bounty programs at small scale — Even a modest bounty attracts researchers who think like attackers, not scanners. They naturally chain weaknesses because that's how you find interesting bugs.

    3. Dependency-focused audits — Most indie apps get compromised through supply chain, not custom code. Monitoring your npm/pip/etc dependencies for known vulns is high ROI.

    Curious about the extension → SaaS pivot: what's the distribution strategy for the SaaS side? Security tools are notoriously hard to sell — buyers want proof you can find real issues, but you can't demo on their production systems without trust first. Chicken-and-egg.

Trending on Indie Hackers
Write COLD DM like this and get clients easily User Avatar 40 comments I built a tool to search all my messages (Slack, LinkedIn, Gmail, etc.) in one place because I was losing my mind. User Avatar 28 comments From building client websites to launching my own SaaS — and why I stopped trusting GA4! User Avatar 21 comments Everyone is Using AI for Vibe Coding, but What You Really Need is Vibe UX User Avatar 17 comments Learning Rails at 48: Three Weeks from Product Owner to Solo Founder User Avatar 17 comments I lost €50K to non-paying clients... so I built an AI contract tool. Now at 300 users, 0 MRR. User Avatar 15 comments