Air Force TFPGA vs mbtget: 2026 Comparison
Air Force TFPGA is a commercial industrial control system security tool by GrammaTech. mbtget is a free industrial control system security tool. Compare features, ratings, integrations, and community reviews side by side to find the best industrial control system security fit for your security stack.
CST VerdictBased on our analysis of NIST CSF 2.0 coverage, core features, company size fit, deployment model, here is our conclusion:
Mid-market and enterprise manufacturers with mission-critical industrial control systems need Air Force TFPGA to detect hardware Trojans and counterfeits at the component level, where supply chain compromise actually enters your infrastructure. The tool requires no golden reference model, meaning you can assess legacy FPGA inventory immediately without waiting for baseline data, and its self-characterization testing directly supports NIST GV.SC supply chain risk management. Skip this if your threat model doesn't include hardware-level adversaries or if you're sourcing components exclusively from tier-one vendors with ironclad provenance; the ROI shrinks fast for organizations with lower supply chain risk exposure.
OT security teams running legacy Modbus networks need mbtget for quick command-line protocol validation without spinning up a full client tool; the 125 GitHub stars and active maintenance signal real operational use in brownfield environments. Its simplicity means you're diagnosing Modbus transactions in seconds, not minutes spent configuring GUI clients or waiting for vendor support. Skip this if your team lacks command-line fluency or needs to monitor continuous traffic; mbtget is a one-off diagnostic instrument, not a persistent network monitor.
