NetFlow tools provide the of your network. They are the ultimate lie detector, revealing the invisible conversations that define the health and security of your digital environment.
| Tool | Language | Storage | Strengths | Weaknesses | |------|----------|---------|-----------|-------------| | | C | Flat files (binary) | Fast, low resource, CLI filters | No native time-series DB | | pmacct | C | SQL, Kafka, MongoDB | Multi-protocol (sFlow, NetFlow, IPFIX), BGP integration | Complex config | | ElastiFlow | Go + Python | Elasticsearch | Rich Kibana dashboards, ASN geoip | Heavy (Elastic cluster) | | GoFlow2 | Go | gRPC/protobuf | 10M+ flows/sec, cloud-native | No storage (sends to DB) | | FlowMeter | Java | InfluxDB/Elastic | Good for Prometheus | Slower at high volume | netflow tools
(originally developed by Cisco, but now an industry standard) is essentially the metadata of your network. It doesn't record the actual video of the movie (the payload of the packet); it records the script, the actors, the time, and the duration. NetFlow tools provide the of your network
Example: 1 Gbps link, avg 1000 byte packets, 1 flow per 10 packets: It doesn't record the actual video of the