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PublicInput vs Varonis Data Security Platform

PublicInput logo

PublicInput

Government

Inclusive Community Engagement

From
$400/month
Free plan
No
Full reviewWebsite
Varonis Data Security Platform logo

Varonis Data Security Platform

Cybersecurity

Data security platform that maps effective permissions, content classification and access activity across file shares, Microsoft 365 and SaaS.

From
$100/year
Free plan
No
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: PublicInput all three plans, Listen, Engage and Engage Plus, are listed as Request Pricing with no published rate, minimum or cost driver; Varonis Data Security Platform deployment is a project rather than an installation: collectors, service accounts, the initial crawl of a large file estate and behavioural baselining typically run for weeks to months before the first genuinely useful report, so value arrives well after the invoice does.
  • They diverge on capability: PublicInput covers Virtual Public Meetings, Varonis Data Security Platform covers Effective permissions modelling.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 30 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which PublicInput and Varonis Data Security Platform actually diverge.

Attributes where PublicInput and Varonis Data Security Platform differ
AttributePublicInputVaronis Data Security Platform
Starting price$400/month$100/year
PlatformsWeb, Ios, AndroidWeb, Desktop
CategoryGovernmentCybersecurity
Founded20142005

Identical on both: pricing model (subscription), 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 PublicInput

  • Virtual Public Meetings
  • Online Surveys
  • Comment Management
  • Multi-language Support
  • Engagement Analytics
  • Zoom
  • Microsoft Teams
  • GovDelivery

Only in Varonis Data Security Platform

  • Effective permissions modelling
  • Content classification
  • Access activity auditing
  • Behavioural alerting
  • Blast radius view
  • Automated remediation
  • Stale data identification
  • Ransomware detection

What people use each for

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

PublicInput

  • Civic engagementnot Varonis Data Security Platform
  • Government consultationnot Varonis Data Security Platform
  • Public input collectionnot Varonis Data Security Platform

Varonis Data Security Platform

  • Answering an auditor or a board asking exactly which sensitive files are reachable by every employee and who has opened themnot PublicInput
  • Cleaning up Microsoft 365 sprawl where Teams, SharePoint sites and shared links accumulated faster than governancenot PublicInput
  • Investigating an insider incident where you need a defensible record of what a departing employee accessed and whennot PublicInput
  • Reducing the blast radius of a compromised account before an incident by removing global access groups and broken inheritancenot PublicInput

Where each one falls short

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

PublicInput

  • All three plans, Listen, Engage and Engage Plus, are listed as Request Pricing with no published rate, minimum or cost driver
  • HTML and CSS customization, custom workflows and approvals, and external system integration with Accela and ESRI are listed as Enterprise Capabilities rather than core platform features
  • Public meetings functionality is sold under a separate Meetings plan rather than being included with the Engagement plans
  • Getting a plan requires booking a consultation and a tailored demo rather than self serve signup

Varonis Data Security Platform

  • Deployment is a project rather than an installation: collectors, service accounts, the initial crawl of a large file estate and behavioural baselining typically run for weeks to months before the first genuinely useful report, so value arrives well after the invoice does.
  • The collection model requires granting the platform broad read access across the data you are trying to protect, which needs its own approval and creates a high-value target, and some change boards spend longer approving that access than approving the purchase.
  • Findings are produced far faster than remediation capacity: an initial scan routinely surfaces hundreds of thousands of overexposed objects, and fixing them means altering permissions owned by business units, so without an executive mandate it becomes a dashboard nobody acts on.
  • Licensing is driven by identity counts and connected data sources, so a directory full of stale accounts and service principals inflates the bill and every additional platform you connect adds cost, which quietly pushes organisations to leave their least-governed systems uncovered.
  • Coverage is deepest in the Microsoft estate and thinner elsewhere: connectors exist for other SaaS and database platforms but they do not all support the same classification, alerting and automated remediation, so a heterogeneous estate receives uneven protection at a uniform price.

Pricing, plan by plan

PublicInput

$400/month
  • Enterprise$400/month
    • Virtual Meetings
    • Surveys
    • Comment Management

Varonis Data Security Platform

$100/year
  • Varonis Essentials$100/year
    • Data classification
    • Access visibility
    • Permission management
  • Varonis Professional$175/year
    • All Essentials features
    • Threat detection
    • User behavior analytics
  • Varonis Enterprise$300/year
    • All Professional features
    • Advanced analytics
    • Incident response

Which should you pick?

Choose PublicInput if

  • You need virtual public meetings.
  • You work on Web, Ios, Android.
  • You also want online surveys.
PublicInput review

Choose Varonis Data Security Platform if

  • You need effective permissions modelling.
  • You work on Web, Desktop.
  • You also want content classification.
Varonis Data Security Platform review

Questions people ask

Is PublicInput or Varonis Data Security Platform better?
Neither clearly leads. PublicInput starts at $400/month and Varonis Data Security Platform at $100/year, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, PublicInput or Varonis Data Security Platform?
PublicInput starts at $400/month and Varonis Data Security Platform at $100/year.
Does PublicInput or Varonis Data Security Platform run on more platforms?
PublicInput runs on Web, Ios, Android. Varonis Data Security Platform runs on Web, Desktop.
What is PublicInput best used for?
PublicInput is most often used for civic engagement, government consultation, public input collection. Of those, civic engagement and government consultation are not what Varonis Data Security Platform is typically brought in for.
What can PublicInput do that Varonis Data Security Platform cannot?
PublicInput covers Virtual Public Meetings, Online Surveys, Comment Management, Multi-language Support. Varonis Data Security Platform covers Effective permissions modelling, Content classification, Access activity auditing, Behavioural alerting.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

PublicInput: How much does PublicInput cost?

PublicInput does not publish pricing on their website. Customers must request a demo or book a meeting to receive a quote based on their specific needs.

Source
Varonis Data Security Platform: Is this data loss prevention?

No, and it is a common confusion. DLP watches data in motion and tries to stop it leaving. Varonis works on data at rest: where it is, who can reach it, and who touched it. They address different halves of the same problem and organisations frequently run both.

PublicInput: What pricing plans does PublicInput offer?

PublicInput offers Engagement Plans and Meetings Plans, but specific pricing for each plan is not publicly available and requires contacting their sales team.

Source
Varonis Data Security Platform: On-premises or SaaS?

It is now sold principally as SaaS, with edge collectors deployed on your network to reach on-premises file shares and directories. Older on-premises deployments with Windows collectors and SQL Server still exist in the field and are being migrated.

Varonis Data Security Platform: Does it need agents on every server?

Generally no. It collects through APIs and network protocols with service accounts, with collectors deployed near the data rather than agents on every host. That is one reason deployment is less invasive than the scale of the data suggests.

Varonis Data Security Platform: How long until it is useful?

Expect weeks to a few months depending on the size of the file estate and how quickly the service accounts and access are approved. The classification and behavioural baselining both need time before the alerts mean anything.

Varonis Data Security Platform: Can it fix the problems it finds automatically?

Yes, it can remove global access groups, repair broken inheritance and quarantine exposed files under policy. Most organisations run this in simulation first, because automatically changing permissions on live business data goes wrong loudly.

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