Softwr

Government · head to head

American Legal Publishing vs Falco

A

American Legal Publishing

Government

Municipal Code Solutions

From
$150/month
Free plan
No
Falco logo

Falco

Cybersecurity

CNCF-graduated runtime threat detection for Linux and Kubernetes using eBPF

From
Free
Free plan
Yes

The short version

  • Only Falco has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: American Legal Publishing a 2019 recodification contract between American Legal Publishing Corporation and the City of Dry Ridge, Kentucky, publicly posted by a separate Kentucky municipality as a model agreement, sets a base codification cost of $9,485 (USD) plus per-page increase rates of $18 (single column) and $21 (dual column) once the code exceeds the estimated page count, a one-time $550 setup fee to put the code in a searchable online format, $495 per year to host the code online after that, and a five-year supplement plan billed at $18-21 per reprinted page plus $200 per annual statutory update. This is one specific signed municipal contract, not a general price list, and actual costs for other municipalities will scale with code length.; Falco falco detects and alerts but does not block; stopping an attack requires wiring up Falco Talon or your own response tooling, so out of the box a confirmed detection still means a human intervening after the fact.
  • They diverge on capability: American Legal Publishing covers Code Codification, Falco covers eBPF kernel instrumentation.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which American Legal Publishing and Falco actually diverge.

Attributes where American Legal Publishing and Falco differ
AttributeAmerican Legal PublishingFalco
Starting price$150/monthFree
Pricing modelsubscriptionOpen source, no licence fee
Free tierNoYes
PlatformsWebLinux, Kubernetes, Self-hosted
CategoryGovernmentCybersecurity
Founded1912Unknown

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in American Legal Publishing

  • Code Codification
  • Online Publishing
  • Print Services
  • Editorial Support
  • Code Search
  • Legislative Systems
  • Document Management
  • Public Portals

Only in Falco

  • eBPF kernel instrumentation
  • System call rules engine
  • Container and Kubernetes context
  • Default rule set
  • Falcosidekick
  • Falco Talon
  • Plugins framework
  • DaemonSet deployment

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

American Legal Publishing

  • Citizen Servicesnot Falco
  • Records Managementnot Falco
  • Public Safetynot Falco
  • Civic Engagementnot Falco

Falco

  • A platform team that needs to know when a shell is opened inside a production container, which image scanning cannot detect because it happens at runtimenot American Legal Publishing
  • A regulated business required to evidence host and container intrusion detection on Kubernetes nodes for an auditnot American Legal Publishing
  • A security team wanting a vendor-neutral detection layer whose rules they can read and modify rather than a black-box agentnot American Legal Publishing
  • A cluster where a compromised dependency might write to sensitive paths or open unexpected outbound connections, and only kernel-level visibility will catch itnot American Legal Publishing

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

American Legal Publishing

  • A 2019 recodification contract between American Legal Publishing Corporation and the City of Dry Ridge, Kentucky, publicly posted by a separate Kentucky municipality as a model agreement, sets a base codification cost of $9,485 (USD) plus per-page increase rates of $18 (single column) and $21 (dual column) once the code exceeds the estimated page count, a one-time $550 setup fee to put the code in a searchable online format, $495 per year to host the code online after that, and a five-year supplement plan billed at $18-21 per reprinted page plus $200 per annual statutory update. This is one specific signed municipal contract, not a general price list, and actual costs for other municipalities will scale with code length.

Falco

  • Falco detects and alerts but does not block; stopping an attack requires wiring up Falco Talon or your own response tooling, so out of the box a confirmed detection still means a human intervening after the fact.
  • The default rule set is noisy in real clusters and generates a large volume of benign matches from normal operational activity; without weeks of tuning, alert fatigue sets in and the team stops reading the feed, which is the usual failure mode.
  • There is no storage, console, search or case management in the project, so a working detection capability means also running Falcosidekick, an event store, a dashboard and alert routing, all of which you build, host and maintain.
  • The modern eBPF driver requires kernel 5.8 or later; older hosts fall back to the legacy probe or the kernel module, which brings driver-building against kernel headers and the operational fragility that comes with it on every kernel upgrade.
  • Per-node syscall instrumentation carries measurable CPU overhead on busy hosts, and the cost scales with syscall volume rather than with cluster size, so the noisiest and most performance-sensitive workloads are exactly the ones that feel it most.

Pricing, plan by plan

American Legal Publishing

$150/month
  • Online Code$150/month
    • Online Publishing
    • Code Updates
    • Search

Falco

Free
  • Falco (open source)Free
    • Apache 2.0 licence, CNCF graduated project
    • eBPF and kernel module drivers
    • Full rules engine and default rule set

Which should you pick?

Choose American Legal Publishing if

  • You need code codification.
  • You also want online publishing.

Choose Falco if

  • You need ebpf kernel instrumentation.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, Kubernetes, Self-hosted.
  • You also want system call rules engine.

Questions people ask

Is American Legal Publishing or Falco better?
Neither clearly leads. American Legal Publishing starts at $150/month and Falco at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, American Legal Publishing or Falco?
Falco has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at $150/month for American Legal Publishing and Free for Falco.
Does American Legal Publishing or Falco run on more platforms?
American Legal Publishing runs on Web. Falco runs on Linux, Kubernetes, Self-hosted.
Can I use Falco for free?
Yes. Falco has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. American Legal Publishing starts at $150/month.
What is American Legal Publishing best used for?
American Legal Publishing is most often used for citizen services, records management, public safety, civic engagement. Of those, citizen services and records management are not what Falco is typically brought in for.
What can American Legal Publishing do that Falco cannot?
American Legal Publishing covers Code Codification, Online Publishing, Print Services, Editorial Support. Falco covers eBPF kernel instrumentation, System call rules engine, Container and Kubernetes context, Default rule set.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Falco: Does Falco block attacks?

No. It detects and emits events. Response requires Falco Talon or your own automation on top.

Falco: Is Falco owned by Sysdig?

Sysdig created and open sourced it, but it graduated within the CNCF in February 2024, so governance sits with the foundation rather than the vendor.

Falco: What does it cost?

The project is Apache 2.0 with no licence fee. The cost is the storage, routing, tuning and staff time needed to make its output useful.

Falco: What kernel version do I need?

Kernel 5.8 or later for the default modern eBPF driver. Older hosts need the legacy eBPF probe or the kernel module.

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