Top 10 OT/ICS Threat Detection Platforms to Consider in 2025

The Evolving Threat Landscape: Why Traditional Detection Fails in OT

In the world of Operational Technology (OT) and Industrial Control Systems (ICS), the security paradigm is fundamentally different from that of traditional Information Technology (IT). While IT prioritizes Confidentiality, OT’s core mission is Safety, Reliability, and Availability. Any security solution that risks operational stability-even for a moment-is a non-starter.

The era of air-gapped security, however, is long over. The urgent drive towards digital transformation, the adoption of Industrial IoT (IIoT), and the increasing convergence of IT and OT networks (often called IT-OT Convergence) have blurred boundaries, creating a massive, interconnected attack surface.

A New Breed of Adversaries

Today’s threat actors-from sophisticated Nation-State groups (like the ones behind TRISIS/TRITON or the Colonial Pipeline incident) to financially motivated Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) affiliates-are actively developing playbooks and bespoke malware, such as PIPEDREAM, specifically designed to manipulate industrial processes.

Traditional IT security tools (like general-purpose SIEMs or EDRs) struggle in this environment because:

• Proprietary Protocols: They cannot natively understand or analyze industrial protocols like Modbus, DNP3, Ethernet/IP, or OPC UA, missing crucial process-level anomalies.
• Passive Requirement: They cannot actively scan or query OT assets (like PLCs, RTUs, and HMIs) without risking downtime or instability. OT detection must be fundamentally passive and non-intrusive.
• Context Vacuum: They lack the deep industrial context-the knowledge of which PLC should talk to which HMI, what constitutes a normal flow rate, or which vendor firmware version has a known vulnerability.

This is where specialized OT/ICS Threat Detection Platforms become indispensable. They are the purpose-built sentinels for the modern industrial ecosystem, providing the essential visibility needed to manage risk and maintain continuous operations.

Key Capabilities of a Best-in-Class ICS Detection Platform

When evaluating platforms to defend your critical infrastructure, it’s vital to look beyond generic security buzzwords. The following capabilities define the state-of-the-art in OT/ICS detection:

1. Granular Asset Inventory & Deep Visibility

• The Problem: You can’t protect what you don’t know exists. Many brownfield sites have outdated or incomplete asset lists.
• The Solution: Platforms must provide continuous, passive discovery of all networked devices (Level 0 through Level 3 of the Purdue Model). This includes vendor, model, firmware version, serial number, backplane composition, and operational status. This level of detail is the foundation for effective vulnerability and risk management.

2. Native OT Protocol Analysis & Deep Packet Inspection (DPI)

• The Problem: Traditional security only sees a TCP/IP connection. Attackers can hide malicious commands within legitimate protocol packets.
• The Solution: The platform must perform Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) to understand the content of industrial communications. It needs to read a Modbus packet and know, for example, that an unauthorized user just attempted to write to a critical coil address.

3. Industrial Anomaly & Behavioral Detection

• The Problem: Signature-based detection is too slow for zero-days or attacks leveraging legitimate tools (“living off the land”).
• The Solution: Leveraging unsupervised Machine Learning (ML), the platform establishes a “golden baseline” of normal network and process behavior. It then flags any deviation-a PLC talking to a new server, an unusual engineering workstation logon time, or a sensor value exceeding its normal operating range-as a potential threat or anomaly.

4. ICS-Specific Threat Intelligence (CTI) & MITRE ATT&CK for ICS Mapping

• The Problem: IT threat feeds often contain irrelevant information for OT.
• The Solution: The platform must ingest and utilize OT-specific CTI on known ICS malware families, adversary TTPs (Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures), and the latest zero-day vulnerabilities in industrial hardware. Crucially, alerts should be mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK for ICS Framework to provide analysts with a clear, actionable understanding of the adversary’s stage in the kill chain.

5. Seamless IT-OT Integration

• The Problem: Security teams often operate in IT and OT silos, leading to slow or missed incident response.
• The Solution: The platform must have robust, bi-directional integration capabilities with the enterprise Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) and Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response (SOAR) platforms. This ensures a unified view of the entire extended enterprise and enables automated response workflows.

The Top 10 ICS Threat Detection Platforms in 2025

Based on current market leadership, innovation in AI/ML, and specialized OT-native capabilities, here are the platforms setting the standard for critical infrastructure protection:

1. Dragos

• OT-Native Focus: Dragos is arguably the most OT-centric platform, co-founded by ICS cybersecurity experts. Its core strength lies in its OT-specific Threat Intelligence (CTI) and a team of industrial incident responders.
• Key Capabilities: The Dragos Platform is famous for its Neighborhood Keeper program (a collective defense model) and its proprietary threat detection logic, known as Threat Intelligence Playbooks. These playbooks encode the knowledge of Dragos’s threat hunters into automated detections, directly leveraging intelligence on adversary groups like ELECTRUM, XENOTIME, and WASP.
• Best For: Organizations with high-stakes, complex OT environments that require the deepest level of ICS threat hunting and adversary knowledge.

2. Nozomi Networks

• Market Position: Often cited as a market leader, Nozomi provides comprehensive visibility and detection for both OT and IoT environments.
• Key Capabilities: Excellent asset inventory and a strong focus on vulnerability management contextualized for the industrial environment. Its detection engine uses a blend of signature, policy, and behavioral anomaly detection, offering a multi-faceted approach to security monitoring.
• Best For: Enterprises with converged IT/OT/IIoT networks seeking a single, scalable platform with robust centralized management.

3. Claroty

• Core Offering: Claroty excels in providing an asset-centric, modular platform that spans the entire risk lifecycle, from discovery to secure remote access.
• Key Capabilities: Its Continuous Threat Detection (CTD) module is highly rated for real-time monitoring and its ability to dissect industrial communications. The platform provides a unique emphasis on Secure Remote Access (SRA), a critical vector for OT compromise, and integrates well with vulnerability assessment tools.
• Best For: Organizations prioritizing asset visibility, vulnerability management, and securing third-party vendor access.

4. Tenable.ot (formerly Indegy)

• The Tenable Advantage: Leveraging Tenable’s IT vulnerability management expertise, Tenable.ot provides unparalleled insights into the security posture of OT assets.
• Key Capabilities: The platform is strong in active and passive asset discovery and is excellent at prioritizing vulnerabilities based on industrial context-a critical feature for risk-based security. Its detection capabilities focus on identifying unauthorized changes to controller logic and device configuration.
• Best For: Security teams looking to unify their IT and OT vulnerability management programs under a single, risk-based view.

5. Cisco Cyber Vision

• Network Integration: Built upon Cisco’s extensive industrial networking portfolio, Cyber Vision offers detection capabilities tightly integrated with the network infrastructure itself.
• Key Capabilities: The solution uses Cisco’s network sensors (like industrial switches and routers) to gather flow and protocol data, providing a deep view into asset inventory and communications without deploying new parallel infrastructure. This simplifies deployment and leverages existing investments.
• Best For: Enterprises with large, existing Cisco industrial network deployments that want deep integration at the network layer.

6. Fortinet FortiGuard for OT

• Platform Approach: Fortinet offers a broad Security Fabric approach that extends its advanced threat detection and prevention capabilities, including AI-driven anomaly detection, into the OT environment.
• Key Capabilities: Excellent firewall integration and segmentation enforcement. The platform focuses on providing a converged security view across IT and OT, utilizing shared threat intelligence feeds adapted for industrial protocols.
• Best For: Companies standardizing on Fortinet’s security stack that require an integrated, end-to-end IT/OT security architecture.

7. Darktrace/OT

• AI-Driven Autonomy: Darktrace’s strength is its foundational use of Unsupervised Machine Learning and Autonomous Response capabilities, which it extends to the OT network.
• Key Capabilities: It creates a unique “pattern of life” for every device, detecting subtle changes in behavior that precede a full-blown attack. Its ability to automatically, non-disruptively contain or mitigate a threat based on observed anomalies is a key differentiator.
• Best For: Organizations seeking highly autonomous detection and response capabilities for rapid identification of novel threats and “unknown unknowns.”

8. Microsoft Defender for IoT (formerly CyberX)

• Cloud & Enterprise Integration: Microsoft’s offering provides deep visibility and agentless monitoring for OT/ICS environments, with seamless integration into the broader Microsoft Defender XDR and Azure Sentinel/Copilot ecosystem.
• Key Capabilities: Excellent for organizations invested in the Microsoft Cloud. It offers rapid deployment and leverages Microsoft’s extensive global threat intelligence to detect threats on-premises, and then correlate them with IT signals in the cloud for a full attack narrative.
• Best For: Large enterprises utilizing Microsoft’s Azure and security portfolio, needing a unified IT-OT-Cloud SecOps experience.

9. Honeywell Forge Cybersecurity

• Domain Expertise: As a major provider of industrial control systems, Honeywell brings a unique perspective: products designed by engineers who understand the control process.
• Key Capabilities: The platform is particularly strong in process-level anomaly detection, monitoring for changes in control parameters, which often signal a sophisticated Stage 2 attack (like Stuxnet or TRISIS). Its solutions are designed to be deployed with minimal impact on their own, or competitor’s, systems.
• Best For: Industrial organizations that value deep-rooted process control and domain-specific knowledge in their security solution.

10. SCADAfence (now part of Palo Alto Networks)

• Strategic Acquisition: Acquired by Palo Alto Networks, SCADAfence offers a strong asset management and threat detection solution that is being integrated into the broader Cortex platform.
• Key Capabilities: Provides comprehensive network monitoring, asset discovery, and vulnerability management. The integration with Palo Alto’s best-of-breed security stack (like Next-Gen Firewalls) is creating a powerful converged IT-OT offering.
• Best For: Enterprises looking for a future-proof solution that will be tightly integrated with a leading vendor’s high-end enterprise security portfolio.

Deployment and Selection: Beyond the Hype

Selecting the right platform is only half the battle; deployment and ongoing operations are what determine success.

Deployment Architectures: Air-Gapped vs. Cloud-Connected

The best platforms offer flexible deployment options to respect the constraints of critical infrastructure:

• Air-Gapped/On-Prem: For the most sensitive, Level 0-2 segments of the Purdue Model, detection engines often run on ruggedized, purpose-built appliances acting as passive network sensors. Data analysis and dashboarding occur on a local, dedicated Central Management Console (CMC) that is either physically air-gapped or uses a one-way data diode to pass alerts to the IT network.
• Hybrid/Cloud-Managed: For less critical or segmented IT-facing OT segments (Level 3/4), the local sensors collect data, but the analysis, threat intelligence ingestion, and dashboarding are managed from a secure cloud instance (e.g., Azure or AWS). This drastically reduces the local infrastructure and management burden.

Critical Considerations for Your Procurement Process

When engaging vendors and preparing an RFP, ensure you address the following critical points:

• Process-Specific Threat Detection: Can the platform detect manipulation of the control process itself (e.g., set-point changes, program downloads), not just network anomalies?
• Ease of Integration: How easily and securely does it integrate with your existing SIEM/SOAR and Vulnerability Management tools? An integrated solution reduces the burden on your limited SecOps staff.
• False Positive Management: OT environments are noisy. A platform that generates an excessive number of false positives is operationally useless. Request evidence of their low false positive rate through Proof of Concept (PoC) testing in your live environment.
• Cost of Ownership: Factor in not just the license cost, but also the cost of the appliance hardware, ongoing threat intelligence subscriptions, and the training required for your IT/OT engineers to effectively use the platform.

Conclusion: Securing the Physical World

The shift from IT-centric security to a dedicated OT/ICS detection strategy is no longer optional-it is a critical mandate for any organization operating essential services or physical processes. The platforms listed above represent the elite guard, each offering unique strengths in a highly specialized field.

The key to success is to move beyond simply installing a box. True cyber resilience comes from selecting a platform that not only provides deep, native visibility but also aligns with your operational priorities, integrates seamlessly into your Security Operations Center (SOC), and is backed by actionable, industrial-grade Threat Intelligence. Investing in a top-tier detection platform is an investment in the safety, stability, and future of your core operations.