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Cortex

4.2.0 open-source

Open source observable analysis platform that lets SOCs and CSIRTs analyze IPs, URLs, files, and hashes at scale via a web UI or REST APIREST APIA web API design style where clients interact with resources over HTTP using standard methods like GET, POST, and DELETE, giving cyber tools a predictable, language-agnostic way to integrate with external services..

Summary

Cortex is an open-source observable analysis platform that lets analysts query IPs, URLs, domain names, files, and hashes against many analyzers through one tool instead of several, and it costs nothing to run. It is self-hosted, used through a web interface for one-off or bulk lookups, or automated via its REST API, which suits SOCs, CSIRTs, and threat intelligence teams who need repeatable enrichment rather than manual lookups per tool. Its documentation positions it as a companion to TheHive and MISP, feeding analyzer output into case management or invoking MISP modules directly, though it also works standalone for teams that just need the analysis layer. Started in 2017 and still active, with 27 contributors and a release 52 days ago, though commit activity has slowed over the past year.

Open source observable analysis platform that lets SOCs and CSIRTs analyze IPs, URLs, files, and hashes at scale via a web UI or REST API.

How Cortex helps

What is actually known about this IP, URL, domain, file, or hash before I sink analyst time into it?

runs the observable against every configured analyzer at once and returns their combined verdicts and metadata in one pass instead of one lookup per tool

Which of the observables from this incident are worth escalating?

takes a bulk list submitted through the web interface and returns per-observable analyzer results, so the ones with hits stand out from the ones that came back clean

How do I get enrichment results into the case I'm already working instead of copying them by hand?

exposes the same analyzers through a REST API so a case management tool or script can submit an observable and receive the analyzer output directly

Can I pull MISP's own modules into the same workflow I use for everything else?

lets Cortex invoke MISP modules alongside its own analyzers, so an observable can be checked against both without switching tools

Who changed how an analyzer or responder is configured, and when?

records catalog configuration changes in the audit log, giving a trail of who altered analyzer or responder setup and when

Is a tool or service I need missing from what's available today?

if no analyzer covers it, a new one can be written and shared, but that only extends future runs, not answers already returned

all 9 features, with the evidence for each →

Languages

Not documented

Features

9 capabilities

Built from Cortex's releases, docs, README and our own runs. “Seen” marks the month we first spotted a release the vendor didn't date. Group names and tags are our labels.

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  • Cortex covers 1 of the 11 logs and telemetry capabilities we track.

What Cortex offers you

  • CI/CD pipeline integration1
  • Kubernetes-native deployment1
All capabilities 9 capabilities
Metadata display shipped Displays analyzer metadata within the user interface. 7 releases · first seen May 2017

release 7 total

  • Improves the job details page with better information display 3.0.0-RC3 · Jun 2019 · source · release history
  • Includes the PAP property in job list outputs 2.1.3 · May 2019 · source · release history
  • Shows PAP (Passive Analysis Priority) value directly in the Org > Analyzers screen for each analyzer row 2.1.0 · Sep 2018 · source · release history
  • Read/Analyze user role can now view and change their own API key via the UI. 2.0.4 · Apr 2018 · source · release history
  • Adds proxy configuration block in the application config file to support proxies. 2.0.0 · Apr 2018 · source · release history
  • Analyzers are now displayed only when their required configuration values are set, preventing UI errors when clicking New Analysis. 2.0.0 · Apr 2018 · source · release history
Job configuration flexibility shipped Allows users to pass arbitrary parameters when creating a job, enabling customized execution contexts. 5 releases · 1 other source · first seen Apr 2018

Also counts toward: CI/CD pipeline integration

release

example

  • Verify passed arguments for a completed analysis directly from the UI report. Navigate to the report page for an existing job to view the 'job parameters' section. 3.1.7 · Oct 2022 · source
Audit logging shipped suggested Records user actions — including changes to analyzer and responder configuration in catalogs — to support traceability and accountability. 3 releases · first seen Apr 2018

Suggested capability: Log storage. This is our guess, not confirmed.

release

  • User actions in catalogs are now recorded in the audit log, improving traceability of analyzer and responder configuration changes. 4.1.0 · Jun 2026 · source · release history
  • Add support of authentication on Docker registry 3.2.0 · Jun 2025 · source · release history
  • Read/Analyze user role can now view and change their own API key via the UI. 2.0.4 · Apr 2018 · source · release history
Kubernetes job configuration shipped Controls how analyzer and responder jobs run in Kubernetes, including retry behaviour and private registry image pull secrets. 1 release · 1 other source · first seen Oct 2026

Also counts toward: Kubernetes-native deployment

release

  • Sets backoffLimit to 0 for analyzer and responder jobs in Kubernetes. 4.2.0 · Oct 2026 · source · release history

example

  • Pull analyzer/responder job images from a private registry in Kubernetes by referencing an image pull secret. job { kubernetes { imagePullSecrets = ["my-registry-secret"] } } 4.2.0 · Oct 2026 · source
Package distribution shipped Generates .deb and .rpm packages to support distributed deployment. 2 releases · first seen May 2017

release

  • Publishes stable versions in beta package channels for earlier availability 2.1.1 · Oct 2018 · source · release history
  • Adds .deb and .rpm package generation for distributed deployment. 1.1.0 · May 2017 · source · release history
OAuth2 authentication shipped Supports OAuth2-based authentication, including PKCE for secure authorization flows. 1 release · first seen Oct 2026

release

  • Adds PKCE support in OAuth2 authentication.⁠︀︄︇︀︅︉︀︅︀︀︃︀︀︅︅︀︅︊︀︄︆︀︃︄⁠ 4.2.0 · Oct 2026 · source · release history
ElasticSearch 8.x backend support shipped Adds compatibility with Elasticsearch 8.x as a backend datastore for storing job data and results. 1 release · first seen Nov 2025

Shared capability: Log storage

release

ElasticSearch 6 backend support shipped Adds compatibility with ElasticSearch 6 as a backend datastore for storing job data and results. 1 release · first seen Jun 2019

Shared capability: Log storage

release

  • Adds support for ElasticSearch 6 as a backend datastore 3.0.0-RC3 · Jun 2019 · source · release history
Cache configuration visibility shipped Exposes full cache configuration details within the analyzer admin interface for operational oversight. 1 release · first seen Sep 2018

release

  • Displays the full cache configuration details on the analyzer admin page 2.1.0 · Sep 2018 · source · release history

Lines in monospace are the tool's own words: help text parsed from its source, or an endpoint from its API document. Under release, a line is our summary of a dated release. Under docs, it is quoted from the tool's own documentation or website. Each links back to the source it came from.

Score card

  1. Shipping velocity releases a month, last 12 months
  2. Documentation quality release-notes rubric, 0–100
  3. Breaking-change discipline how rarely a release breaks users, and notice given
  4. Maintenance risk quiet time against its own cadence, maintainers
  5. Innovation & surface new capabilities, API and MCP surface
  6. Community health
  7. Contributor trend distinct committers, this year against last
  8. Maintainer concentration bus factor now against a year ago
  9. Issue backlog trend issues closed per issue opened, 12 months
  10. Responsiveness median time to a maintainer’s first reply

Nine scores for Cortex, each built from the releases, notes and API history this site tracks — and, on Researcher and Business, where it stands among every measured tool in its category and how that has moved.

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Each score is 0–100 on a published rubric, derived from data this site already shows. A dimension we cannot measure says so — it is never scored 0 and never enters a rank.

How this is scored
  • Shipping velocity — releases a month over the last 12 months, on a log scale where 16 a month scores 100. Needs 3 releases in the window.
  • Documentation quality — the release-notes rubric published on the analytics page, unchanged.
  • Breaking-change discipline — the share of releases carrying a breaking change (none scores 100, half or more scores 0). Only projects that label breaking changes are measured: a clean record cannot be told from an unlabelled one.
  • Maintenance risk — quiet time measured against the tool's own release cadence (quiet longer than 90 days and three typical gaps scores 0), plus the number of active maintainers and whether contributors are growing, where known. Higher is lower risk.
  • Innovation & surface — new capabilities in the feature ledger this year, API and MCP operations added, and the share of commits that are features: the mean of whichever we hold.
  • Community health (open-source tools only) — each is a direction, not a size: contributors this year against last, the bus factor now against a year ago, and issues closed per issue opened, where steady scores 50, doubled 100 and halved 0; plus the median time to a maintainer's first reply (an hour scores about 100, a month or more 0). A commercial card has no repository and carries none of the four.
  • Documented delivery (commercial tools) — when a vendor's documented new capabilities have slowed against its own baseline, that counts against the overall standing as heavily as two low dimensions. Steady delivery, or too little history to judge, leaves the standing alone; it is never a sixth score.
  • Open-source tools are scored on repository signals; commercial tools on their published changelog. Ranks compare tools within one category and one profile and need at least five measured peers; the overall standing needs three ranked dimensions. Best-in-breed or consolidator is a shape, not a quality, and is never scored.

Release-note detail over time

See how much detail Cortex puts in its release notes, quarter by quarter, and compare it with tracked tools in the same category. This history uses up to ten retained, reviewed notes per tool; sparse or blank older quarters may reflect that limit.

Checking release-note history…

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Releases

Show

16 entries

  1. October 20261
  2. June 20261
  3. November 20251
  4. June 20251
  5. October 20221
  6. September 20202
  7. June 20191
  8. May 20192
  9. October 20181
  10. September 20181
  11. April 20183
  12. May 20171
    Show

    16 entries

    Project health

    Issue, contributor and maintainer activity in TheHive-Project/Cortex, 2023-10 – 2026-09, as of 2026-09-25. Twelve-month figures first; the trend lines run the whole window.

    1. Contributors 3 ±0 vs prior 12 months
    2. Maintainers 1 +0 joined · −1 left, last 12 months
    3. Bus factor 1 committers behind half the commits
    4. Community-filed 100% of issues opened, last 12 months
    5. Median time to close not measured issues closed, last 12 months
    6. Open backlog 160 of 448 issues ever filed
    1. Issues opened / month 0 · 0 communitymaintainers
    2. Open backlog 160
    3. Contributors / month 0
    4. Commits / month 0
    5. Stars 1,626
    Issue themes, last 12 months
    • other 100%

    Counts from the project's public repository and git history; no individuals are identified. Maintainers are the committers covering 80% of the last year's commits. how we measure this

    Libraries its release ships

    What its latest release locks, checked against known advisories.

    None of its release's images build from a lockfile we can read.

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