PacketSnitch vs Scapy

PacketSnitch is a desktop application for investigating network traffic in PCAP and PCAPNG captures. It turns files into searchable, protocol-aware information and can extract hosts, credentials, certificates, files, locations, protocols, anomalies and threat-intelligence hits. Analysis tools include stream reconstruction, protocol decoding, complex filters, visualizations, threat-intelligence scoring, file carving, GeoIP enrichment and capture workspaces. Traffic decryption, flow analysis and CLI tools are also listed. ZIP-packaged plugins can be installed through Settings. The bundled Python backend parses captures locally, and the maker says captures are not uploaded. Optional network activity includes configured LLM calls, threat-intelligence lookups and anonymous metrics; metrics can be disabled in Settings. Optional LLM analysis supports Ollama, OpenRouter and Cohere when configured. New installations get full features in Demo mode for 30 days, then move to Free mode with core analysis and reduced functionality. Prebuilt installers are available for Windows 10/11 and Linux DEB or RPM distributions. macOS has no signed installer, though running from source is described. The maker says analysis outputs may not be accurate or complete and should be independently validated before consequential use.

Scapy is a free Python packet manipulation program and library for forging or decoding packets, sending and capturing them, and matching requests with replies. It can run as an interactive shell or be used as a library. Listed tasks include scanning, tracerouting, probing, unit tests, attacks and network discovery. Users can set arbitrary field values and stack protocol layers rather than rely on predetermined templates; after a probe, Scapy returns full decoded packets before interpretation for further analysis. It can read and store pcap files, inject invalid frames and custom 802.11 frames, and be extended with protocols and add-ons. Scapy runs on Linux, macOS, BSD and Windows, though Windows installation requires Npcap. Optional plotting needs Matplotlib; TLS decryption and PKI operations need the cryptography package. The code, tests and tools use GPL v2, while the documentation uses CC BY-NC-SA 2.5. Documentation includes installation instructions, usage guides, troubleshooting and an API reference. The project supports only its latest master version, and critical bugs should be reported privately through GitHub’s security tab.