noahpb
commented
1 week ago | Criteria | KubeArmor | NeuVector |
|---|---|---|
| Pros | - Preemptively prevents malicious actions ("in-line mitigation") | - Full end-to-end security, including runtime, network, and vulnerability protection |
| - CNCF project, strong open-source community | - Network segmentation with zero-trust enforcement | |
| - All rules and capabilities managed via a single Kubernetes spec | - Enterprise-ready with compliance, vulnerability scanning, and firewall features | |
| - Offers node level protection | - Integrated enforcement, blocking malicious behavior in real-time | |
| - Robust examples library | ||
| Cons | - No user interface | - Heavier resource consumption due to the extensive feature set |
| - Limited visibility out of the box | - Complexity may overwhelm smaller deployments | |
- Security of the tool itself is still maturing (see KubeArmor/issues/1186) |
- Full enterprise features require a commercial version | |
| - Stale docs across their GH repos | ||
| Community Adoption | 1.5k stars, Slack channel with 100+ members, <10 known adopters, active community engagement from maintainers. Available on several CSP marketplaces. | Enterprise focus, strong post-acquisition support by SUSE; less adoption in the general open-source community |
| Chainguard / IronBank Support | Neither | NeuVector is supported in IronBank (DoD-approved hardened container registry), suitable for government use |
| Runtime Detection | Workload focused - monitors network, process, file and kernel behavior. Read more here | Behavioral learning with runtime detection for container processes, files, and network traffic |
| Network Security | Provides visibilty into network flows via discovery-engine and autogenerates least-permissive Network Policies, can monitor and prevent process network activity | Provides network-layer security, including segmentation, DPI (Deep Packet Inspection), and zero-trust policies |
| Compliance & Vulnerability Scanning | No support natively or via addon. Available via Enterprise license | Built-in vulnerability scanning, compliance checks for PCI-DSS, GDPR, NIST, HIPAA |
| Enforcement | Can Allow, Block or Audit any container file, network, process or k8s resource event | Native enforcement engine to block network, process, and container-level threats in real-time |
| Out-of-the-Box Experience | Helm chart, cli tool for bootstrapping, default configurations available on GitHub | Comprehensive out-of-the-box security, with network policies, vulnerability scans, and compliance reports pre-configured |
| Helm / Config as Code Alignment | Official Helm chart available, supports configuration via Kubernetes YAML files, easy to integrate into CI/CD pipelines | Helm chart available, configuration-as-code support with advanced controls; more complex due to the breadth of features |
| Ease of Use / Learning Curve | Policies are configurable via several CRDs. Specification is straightforward. GitHub repo offers plenty of example scenarios and use cases as well as expected alerts | Steeper learning curve due to the full feature set (network, compliance, runtime) but offers behavioral learning to automate setup |
| Resource Consumption | Minimal resource footprint (monitors syscalls), suited for resource-constrained environments. Benchmarking data available here | Resource-intensive, especially with network security, DPI, and multi-layer enforcement |
| Integration with CI/CD | No documented use cases for CI/CD, however metrics and alerts can be used to block non-conformant resources in pre-production environments | Integrates well with CI/CD tools, can block non-compliant containers at runtime and during image scans |
| Policy Management | Rule-based system, requires manual policy writing for custom security postures. Sample configurations available. Provides automatic generation of K8s NetworkPolicies | Automated policy learning with ability to create manual policies, suitable for both network and runtime security |
| Enterprise Support / Features | More features available from AccuKnox via their Cloud Workload Protection Platform CWPP | Full enterprise support, including multi-cloud deployments, built-in compliance management, and security dashboards |
| Service Mesh Compatibility | No native integration | Provides strong integration with service meshes, enforcing network security and segmentation policies within service mesh traffic |
| Logging and Reporting | Integrates with logging systems like Fluentd, ELK, and Prometheus for alerting and reporting; otel support, dashboards. Tutorial here | Built-in real-time dashboards for network and runtime events; advanced reporting for compliance and threat detection |
| Cloud Provider Compatibility | Extensive testing across multiple K8s Distros/CSPs and Host OS's | Optimized for multi-cloud (AWS, GCP, Azure) and hybrid environments; certified for key public cloud providers and supports multi-cluster setups |
https://kubearmor.io/
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Definition of done: A scorecard evaluating the above criteria.