phpMyAdmin Honeypot vs Acalvio ShadowPlex: 2026 Comparison
phpMyAdmin Honeypot is a free honeypots & deception tool. Acalvio ShadowPlex is a commercial honeypots & deception tool by Acalvio Technologies. Compare features, ratings, integrations, and community reviews side by side to find the best honeypots & deception 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:
Teams defending legacy infrastructure with exposed phpMyAdmin instances should deploy phpMyAdmin Honeypot to catch reconnaissance before it becomes lateral movement; it's free, requires minimal setup, and gives you visibility into attack patterns targeting your actual admin interfaces. The 68 GitHub stars and active maintenance suggest real operational use, though this is a single-purpose tool that won't replace a broader deception platform if you're running multiple exposed services. Skip this if your phpMyAdmin instances are already behind VPN or network segmentation; the honeypot's value collapses once attackers can't reach it.
Mid-market and enterprise security teams with exposed APIs, web applications, or IoT infrastructure should use ShadowPlex to catch reconnaissance and credential attacks before they reach production systems. The platform's external-facing decoys generate high-fidelity threat intelligence in STIX format while monitoring for password spraying and brute-force attempts, directly addressing ID.RA and DE.CM in NIST CSF 2.0. Skip this if your attack surface is entirely internal or if you need deep visibility into post-breach lateral movement; ShadowPlex is optimized for early detection at the perimeter, not incident response.
