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Cybersecurity · head to head

Baffle vs Trimble Unity Maintain

Baffle logo

Baffle

Cybersecurity

Transparent proxy that encrypts, tokenises and masks database fields without application code changes

From
On request
Free plan
No
Full reviewWebsite
Trimble Unity Maintain logo

Trimble Unity Maintain

Government

GIS-centric public asset and work management, the product formerly sold as Cityworks

From
On request
Free plan
No
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Baffle the proxy sits in the production data path, so it becomes a latency contributor and a failure domain, and any deployment needs load and failover testing that customers routinely underestimate.; Trimble Unity Maintain esri ArcGIS is a hard prerequisite, so an organisation without it faces a second substantial licence and a GIS programme before the maintenance system can be used at all.
  • They diverge on capability: Baffle covers Transparent proxy deployment, Trimble Unity Maintain covers Built on ArcGIS.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Baffle and Trimble Unity Maintain actually diverge.

Attributes where Baffle and Trimble Unity Maintain differ
AttributeBaffleTrimble Unity Maintain
PlatformsLinux, WebWeb, iOS, Android, Windows
CategoryCybersecurityGovernment

Identical on both: starting price (On request), pricing model (quote), free tier (No), 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 Baffle

  • Transparent proxy deployment
  • Field-level encryption
  • Tokenisation
  • Format-preserving de-identification
  • Dynamic data masking
  • Bring your own key
  • Analytics and pipeline support
  • AI pipeline protection

Only in Trimble Unity Maintain

  • Built on ArcGIS
  • Service requests
  • Work order management
  • Permits and licensing
  • Mobile field access
  • Storeroom and inventory
  • Operational Insights
  • AgileAssets convergence

What people use each for

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

Baffle

  • A bank with a legacy application it cannot safely refactor that has an audit finding requiring field-level encryption of account datanot Trimble Unity Maintain
  • A company wanting to take a reporting database out of PCI scope by tokenising card fields before they landnot Trimble Unity Maintain
  • A healthcare organisation that must ensure database administrators and cloud operators cannot read patient identifiers in the tables they administernot Trimble Unity Maintain
  • A team moving regulated data into a warehouse or an AI retrieval pipeline that needs identifiers de-identified in transit without rewriting the ingest jobsnot Trimble Unity Maintain

Trimble Unity Maintain

  • A water utility wanting valve exercising and hydrant flushing recorded against the same GIS features the engineering team maintainsnot Baffle
  • A city consolidating a citizen service request line, work orders and inspections into one location-based systemnot Baffle
  • A state transportation department managing pavement and bridge assets with linear referencing rather than point assetsnot Baffle
  • A public works department that has already licensed ArcGIS Enterprise and wants to avoid rekeying its asset inventorynot Baffle

Where each one falls short

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

Baffle

  • The proxy sits in the production data path, so it becomes a latency contributor and a failure domain, and any deployment needs load and failover testing that customers routinely underestimate.
  • What you can still do in SQL depends on the protection mode chosen, and stronger modes restrict comparisons, joins and aggregations on protected columns, which can quietly break existing reports and analytics.
  • Database and driver coverage is finite, so an organisation with an unusual engine, an old driver or heavy use of stored procedures may find its most important system is exactly the one not supported.
  • Pricing is unpublished and scales with protected data stores, which means an enterprise trying to protect a long tail of small databases pays disproportionately compared with protecting a handful of large ones.
  • Key management is your responsibility under bring your own key, and while that is the correct security posture, it moves a real operational burden and a genuine data-loss risk onto the customer.

Trimble Unity Maintain

  • Esri ArcGIS is a hard prerequisite, so an organisation without it faces a second substantial licence and a GIS programme before the maintenance system can be used at all.
  • The product is mid-rename from Cityworks to Trimble Unity Maintain with transition timelines Trimble has not committed to publicly, leaving contracts, documentation and integrator experience split between two names.
  • CVE-2025-0994, a deserialisation flaw in Cityworks, was exploited in the wild and listed by CISA in February 2025, which makes on-premise deployments a patching obligation rather than a set-and-forget install.
  • Because assets live in the GIS, changing the asset model is a GIS division change, so maintenance teams cannot restructure their own hierarchy without another department in the loop.
  • It is built for North American public sector practice, and the permitting, funding source and reporting models do not map cleanly onto other countries or onto private industrial estates.

Pricing, plan by plan

Baffle

On request
  • Baffle Data Protection Services$undefined/year
    • Quoted by protected data stores and deployment scale
    • Self-managed and cloud marketplace deployment options
    • Annual subscription

Trimble Unity Maintain

On request
  • Trimble Unity Maintain$undefined/year
    • Annual subscription sized by population served, asset volume and user count
    • Esri ArcGIS Enterprise or ArcGIS Online licensing required separately
    • Hosted and on-premise deployment priced differently

Which should you pick?

Choose Baffle if

  • You need transparent proxy deployment.
  • You work on Linux, Web.
  • You also want field-level encryption.
Baffle review

Choose Trimble Unity Maintain if

  • You need built on arcgis.
  • You work on Web, iOS, Android, Windows.
  • You also want service requests.
Trimble Unity Maintain review

Questions people ask

Is Baffle or Trimble Unity Maintain better?
Neither clearly leads. Baffle starts at On request and Trimble Unity Maintain at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Baffle or Trimble Unity Maintain?
Baffle starts at On request and Trimble Unity Maintain at On request.
Does Baffle or Trimble Unity Maintain run on more platforms?
Baffle runs on Linux, Web. Trimble Unity Maintain runs on Web, iOS, Android, Windows.
What is Baffle best used for?
Baffle is most often used for a bank with a legacy application it cannot safely refactor that has an audit finding requiring field-level encryption of account data, a company wanting to take a reporting database out of pci scope by tokenising card fields before they land, a healthcare organisation that must ensure database administrators and cloud operators cannot read patient identifiers in the tables they administer, a team moving regulated data into a warehouse or an ai retrieval pipeline that needs identifiers de-identified in transit without rewriting the ingest jobs. Of those, a bank with a legacy application it cannot safely refactor that has an audit finding requiring field-level encryption of account data and a company wanting to take a reporting database out of pci scope by tokenising card fields before they land are not what Trimble Unity Maintain is typically brought in for.
What can Baffle do that Trimble Unity Maintain cannot?
Baffle covers Transparent proxy deployment, Field-level encryption, Tokenisation, Format-preserving de-identification. Trimble Unity Maintain covers Built on ArcGIS, Service requests, Work order management, Permits and licensing.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Baffle: Do applications need code changes?

No. That is the central design choice. Baffle intercepts traffic as a proxy rather than requiring an SDK call at every read and write.

Trimble Unity Maintain: Is Cityworks discontinued?

Not discontinued, renamed. It is becoming Trimble Unity Maintain, converging with AgileAssets, and Trimble has not published a final transition date.

Baffle: Can you still query encrypted columns?

Partly, and it depends on the protection mode. Some modes preserve equality matching and format, stronger modes restrict what SQL operations remain possible, so this must be tested against your actual queries.

Trimble Unity Maintain: Do I need Esri ArcGIS?

Yes. The product is built on ArcGIS and cannot be deployed without an Esri licence.

Baffle: Does it take systems out of PCI scope?

Tokenisation can reduce scope by ensuring card data never lands in the protected system, but scope reduction is an assessor judgement, not a product setting.

Trimble Unity Maintain: Was there a security incident?

Yes. CVE-2025-0994 in Cityworks was exploited in the wild and added to the CISA known exploited vulnerabilities catalogue in February 2025.

Baffle: Who holds the encryption keys?

You do, through your own key management service. Baffle supports bring your own key rather than holding customer keys itself.

Trimble Unity Maintain: Can it handle roads and pavement as well as pipes?

Yes, through the AgileAssets lineage now inside the Unity Maintain family, which adds linear referencing for transportation assets.

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