Guardian360 vs Aqua Security
Works alongside Aqua Security
Guardian360 works alongside Aqua Security, covering the ground that vendor leaves open. A US and Israeli cloud native security platform protecting containers, Kubernetes, serverless and VMs from build to runtime, sold to large enterprises and government; it also maintains the open-source Trivy scanner.
What Aqua Security is good at
US and Israeli cloud native security platform that protects containers, Kubernetes, serverless and VMs from build to runtime, sold to large enterprises and government. It launched Aqua Compass, an MCP server for agentic containment, with dashboards that put a money figure on runtime risk. It also maintains Trivy, the open-source scanner.
Side by side
How they compare
| Guardian360 | Aqua Security | |
|---|---|---|
| Company origin & data residency | Netherlands, EU-only | Israel (Ramat Gan) and United States (Boston); SaaS with an EU region in Frankfurt, or self-hosted, including air-gapped |
| Partner model | Partner-only | Direct enterprise sales plus partners; MSP, integrator, reseller, distribution and federal tracks; AWS Marketplace private offers |
| Deployment approach | Agentless SaaS | Agent-based by design: enforcers inside running workloads, plus agentless posture and image scanning; SaaS or self-hosted |
| Compliance coverage | 25+ frameworks, continuously mapped | Cloud controls mapped to FedRAMP, DORA, NIST, PCI DSS, HIPAA, GDPR, SOC 2 and CIS; no NIS2 and no Dutch norm named |
| Intrusion detection | Built-in honeypots | Runtime detection and blocking inside containers, Kubernetes, serverless and VMs; no network IDS or honeypots |
| Microsoft 365 insight | Included | No; cloud workloads only |
| Container & cloud scanning | Planned for 2026 | Yes, and it is their core: images, Kubernetes, workload protection, posture and software supply chain across all major clouds and on premises |
| Mobile app | Yes (Android & iOS) | Not published |
| Automation & ease of use | High | High for DevSecOps teams; policy-driven enforcement and an MCP server for AI agents, built for engineers rather than generalists |
| Pricing / MSP model | MSP pricing per employee / IP | Not published; AWS private-offer list prices of USD 50,000, 100,000 and 150,000 a year per plan; MSP terms not published |
| Auto-remediation | Partner-guided | Yes at runtime; blocks unsafe actions and applies compensating controls without a patch, with agentic containment under human oversight |
| Free trial / quick scan | Yes, incl. free WordPress plugin | Demo on request; Trivy is free and open source |
| Smallest client size | From 10 employees / IPs | Large enterprise and government; smallest public plan USD 50,000 a year |
| Data sovereignty (EU-only) | Yes | Partly; Frankfurt region or self-hosted, but an Israeli and US company |
| Supply-chain compliance | Yes, NIS2/Cbw + CRA questionnaires | Software supply chain only (pipelines, artefacts, SBOM); no supplier questionnaires |
Based on publicly available information at the time of writing. Vendors evolve quickly, always verify the latest details with each provider.
When Aqua Security may fit better
A large enterprise or government platform team that runs containers and Kubernetes in production and needs runtime protection inside the workloads, from build to run.
When Guardian360 fits better
An organisation that needs the whole picture around the clusters: Guardian360 Lighthouse reads the external perimeter, websites, the Microsoft 365 tenant and the network, maps findings to 25+ frameworks including the Dutch norms, and is EU-hosted and partner-delivered from ten employees up.
Common questions
Guardian360 vs Aqua Security, answered
Is Guardian360 an alternative to Aqua Security?
No, they are complementary. Cloud and container scanning is on our roadmap rather than shipping today, and Aqua is a pioneer of container security. Guardian360 Lighthouse covers the rest of the organisation, the offices, users, websites and Microsoft 365, and maps findings to frameworks including the Dutch norms.
What is the main difference?
Aqua secures what runs inside the clusters. Lighthouse assesses the whole organisation around them and translates every finding into business risk and compliance evidence across 25+ frameworks, hosted entirely in the EU.
See it on your own environment
Run a free Quickscan, start a trial, or talk to a partner. Guardian360 is delivered exclusively through our partners.