# Deception technology: what AI models recommend, October 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, October 2026 Edition. Asked as "deception technology platform" and as "honeypot and decoy tool", six framings each, to fourteen models with search on, on behalf of a mid-market B2B company. Added to the October 2026 Edition on October 4, 2026; its answers are read by the distilled judge (ai-indexes-judge-qwen3-14b-run3), not the claude-opus-5 judge of the earlier categories. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/security/deception-technology/

**Standing:** Thinkst Canary leads with 37% of first choices; verdict contested. 46 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| # | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Thinkst Canary | 37% | 5% | 40 |
| 2 | Acalvio ShadowPlex | 9% | 14% | 42 |
| 3 | Tracebit | 7% | 17% | 18 |
| 4 | OpenCanary | 4% | 0% | 17 |
| 5 | Fortinet FortiDeceptor | 2% | 0% | 10 |
| 6 | T-Pot | 2% | 9% | 11 |
| 7 | Illusive Networks | 2% | 42% | 12 |
| 8 | Attivo Networks | 0% | 18% | 11 |
| 9 | CounterCraft | 0% | 21% | 14 |
| 10 | Fidelis Deception | 0% | 21% | 14 |
| 11 | Zscaler Deception | 0% | 33% | 12 |

## Each model's first choice on the direct prompt

- Claude Haiku 4.5: Deceptive Bytes; alternatives Acalvio 360 Deception, Illusive, Thinkst Canary
- GPT-5.4 mini: Thinkst Canary; alternatives Acalvio ShadowPlex
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Thinkst Canary; alternatives SentinelOne Singularity Hologram, Tracebit
- Perplexity Sonar: Acalvio ShadowPlex; alternatives Fortinet FortiDeceptor, Thinkst Canary
- Grok 4.1 Fast: Acalvio ShadowPlex; alternatives Fortinet FortiDeceptor, Thinkst Canary
- Mistral Small: Acalvio ShadowPlex, Attivo Networks ThreatDefend
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Tracebit; alternatives Acalvio ShadowPlex, Fidelis Deception, FortiDeceptor
- Llama 4 Maverick: no first choice
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Honeypot.io; alternatives Attivo Networks, Cymulate, Microsoft Defender XDR
- Kimi K2: Thinkst Canary; alternatives TrapEye, Trapster
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Rapid7 InsightIDR; alternatives Acalvio ShadowPlex, Fortinet FortiDeceptor
- MiniMax M2.5: Acalvio ShadowPlex, Illusive Networks
- GPT-6 Luna: Tracebit; alternatives Acalvio ShadowPlex, Thinkst Canary, Zscaler Deception
- Muse Glimmer 30B: Fortinet FortiDeceptor, Rapid7 Incident Command; alternatives Acalvio ShadowPlex, Proofpoint, Thinkst Canary

## Sources the answers cite

77 of 84 answers came back with a source list, from 14 of 14 models. Sites named in the most answers:

- acalvio.com: 49 answers, 113 citations
- guideflow.com: 41 answers, 44 citations
- linkedin.com: 33 answers, 36 citations
- expertinsights.com: 29 answers, 29 citations
- devopsschool.com: 24 answers, 24 citations
- sourceforge.net: 22 answers, 35 citations
- g2.com: 22 answers, 30 citations
- slashdot.org: 21 answers, 24 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://guideflow.com/blog/deception-technology-software (34 answers)
- https://linkedin.com/pulse/cyber-deception-technology-cisos-guide-choosing-right-anand-akela-zbmlc (33 answers)
- https://expertinsights.com/network-security/best-deception-technology-companies (29 answers)
- https://acalvio.com/preemptive-security/competitive-intelligence-cyber-deception (28 answers)
- https://devopsschool.com/blog/top-10-deception-technology-tools-features-pros-cons-comparison (24 answers)
- https://sourceforge.net/software/deception-technology (20 answers)
- https://acalvio.com/agentic-ai-security/deception-technology-buyers-guide-10-selection-criteria (16 answers)
- https://acalvio.com/agentic-ai-security/deception-technology-solutions-an-enterprise-buyers-framework-for-2026 (14 answers)
- https://canary.tools/ (14 answers)
- https://cybersecuritynews.com/deception-tools (13 answers)

## Warned against

- Illusive Networks: 5 of 12 labels negative. "Pure network-wide standalone deception from Illusive is essentially sunsetted" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt)
- Acalvio ShadowPlex: 6 of 42 labels negative. "look out for architectural red flags when evaluating active deception platforms (such as those from Acalvio, CounterCraft, or Fidelis Security)" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt)
- Zscaler Deception: 4 of 12 labels negative. "one listed dislike says endpoint decoys created unnecessary network noise. That's a reason to test the feature in your own network—not, by itself, a reason to reject the product." (GPT-6 Luna, negative prompt)
- CounterCraft: 3 of 14 labels negative. "look out for architectural red flags when evaluating active deception platforms (such as those from Acalvio, CounterCraft, or Fidelis Security)" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt)

## Record

- Method: https://it-ai-index.com/methodology/
- Raw judge labels and full responses: https://it-ai-index.com/data/
- License: CC BY 4.0. Cite as IT AI Recommendation Index, October 2026 Edition, it-ai-index.com.