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I am an IT system support person, and my use cases with Cisco Duo started out with helping clients at my firm and the firms my contracting agencies had by teaching them how to set up Cisco Duo and understand how to use it. Eventually, some of the systems I have access to on my own, usually the corporate systems and employee portals, were Cisco Duo-protected. It has been a split between using Cisco Duo and Microsoft Authenticator, depending on how the MFA has been set up. I started out as IT support, helping people install Cisco Duo on their Android and Apple devices, and I believe they actually had a computer client. Eventually, I had to use it in my own work to authenticate and gain access to the systems I support. Moreover, I have seen a lot of it used to access employee portals, either by end-user employees or my own employee portals.

My last access to Cisco Duo involved helping people either activate their Cisco Duo accounts on their individual Apple or Android devices, or if they were locked out, unlock their accounts or move them over to a new device.

The features I use in Cisco Duo include Duo Pushes to confirm my identity to the device, and eventually as MFA security was increased, I actually had to use exchange passcodes. Sometimes, I have to go into the site and get into Cisco Duo to retrieve the passcode, and many of them have been two-factor, where the sites send a passcode that I have to enter into Cisco Duo. It has been more of the latter.

I have not seen issues with lagging or crashing on Cisco Duo's end; it was usually on the client end, often because someone set up a bad upgrade or there were connection issues with the Cisco Duo cloud through the administrative site.

As support, I do not find it an issue with Cisco Duo product itself; it is more an issue of organization administration. Often, people do not receive expiration messages, and sometimes, for security reasons, accounts get disabled without notifying the end user, so they mistakenly think something has gone wrong when it really just needs to be re-enabled on the external system. It is primarily an issue on the administrative side of the firm I am working for.

I am familiar with Cisco Duo and have probably been using it since around 2020.

Cisco Duo seems very scalable. In my experience, I started with a small-medium business, and in my last contracting position, it was a large one for a major worldwide airline that had hundreds of thousands of devices that could use Cisco Duo, and it scaled very well. The administrative site was also very easy to navigate for locating people and devices. I also have a background in computer asset management, so I have the skill set to locate device records easily.

In terms of quality and speed of support for Cisco Duo, I find it just as fine as any other Cisco product. It is simpler at the endpoint; there is much less involved in calling technical support to resolve issues compared to other Cisco products. I have also dealt with firewalls and VPNs, and I can say that Cisco Duo administration is much less involved than other Cisco areas. I would rate support for Cisco Duo a 10, as I have never had a negative experience.

Positive

My experience with MFA is primarily Cisco Duo and Microsoft Authenticator, and I have used them both similarly, either as pushes for allow or deny or as stronger MFA requirements such as exchanging passcodes. From my experience, Cisco Duo seems a lot easier to install and operate. In helping add accounts to either my devices or to the devices of the people I am supporting, both systems work well. I can get passcodes or utilize QR codes. One thing I noticed about my current firm is their initial hesitation to consider QR code exchange secure, but eventually, it was re-enabled to reduce support times. As an administrator, I have done both, pushing activation to pre-installed devices already registered to a system or actually sending people a QR code to their email, and both methods worked fine with personal and corporate email.

The setup of Cisco Duo is easy. Most of the time, the setup took me walking the end user through the installation over the phone, but if they understood how to get to their App Store or Play Store, it takes probably under two minutes. Most of it depends on wide area network or internet speed; activating directly on a client device versus sending an activation email makes a difference. If it is all set up and requires only sending an activation code message, it is about a minute. Cisco Duo installs very quickly on Android and Apple devices, provided the Wi-Fi connection is good.

From what I was involved in with Cisco Duo, we actually conducted Cisco Duo pushes through the management systems, enabling that through MDMs, the Bomgar. I found it pretty easy to grab the latest version of the Cisco Duo installer to update the packages on our management systems. I do not remember having any problems; it is one of the easier applets to package or to already find packaged.

I am currently between jobs or contracts, but I believe for the MFA administrator, it would help if they set up the filters for gathering the data. Cisco Duo seems very scalable. In my experience, I started with a small-medium business, and in my last contracting position, it was a large one for a major worldwide airline that had hundreds of thousands of devices that could use Cisco Duo, and it scaled very well. The administrative site was also very easy to navigate for locating people and devices. I also have a background in computer asset management, so I have the skill set to locate device records easily. I have given this review an overall rating of 10.

Okta Platform's main use case for our organization is workforce identity. We use Okta Platform as a workforce identity solution in order to secure the identity and access to all the cloud applications we have. We are also distributors of Okta Platform, so I have visibility from both a partner perspective as a distributor and as a customer.

We have several cloud applications and we need Okta Platform Workforce Identity to access with multifactor authentication and single sign-on. Because we are a multinational company, all employees can access their applications from everywhere using Okta Platform to access in a secure way. This is the main scenario regarding our workflow and our company.

We don't use those features at the moment, so I don't have that view currently. From the feedback I'm receiving from customers, Okta Platform is working well to improve the features, and maybe in the future, I could have a better view on that.

The best features Okta Platform offers include a well-done single sign-on that is easy to configure and use. The big improvement and the big quality of the product is the multifactor authentication that is complete and full of customizations. The delivery and deployment is really easy to do, and you can integrate Okta Platform with several applications, making it really easy to configure and integrate. You can set specific customizations for your specific needs. For example, we work around different countries, and we can put a specific double check for the identity when employees are working from and connecting from other countries than the specific countries where they typically work. This is really useful for our use case.

We are a multinational company, and employees used to travel around different countries and need specific features and specific settings. This is the main important aspect for us in order to use in the best way the different platforms and the different software that we have in our company. Okta Platform's multifactor authentication is really easy to use, really fast, and you don't need extra tools or software, just an internet connection. When you log in to your application, you will have Okta Platform's interface that is really friendly and easy to use. Additionally, Okta Platform has a strong integration with CrowdStrike, the EDR solution that our main customers use, and this integration is really easy to use and valuable for sharing data about identity to CrowdStrike's EDR.

I don't have specific suggestions, but for sure, Okta Platform could improve with maybe some language tools. The translation in different languages could help employees around different countries, and these important aspects could be improved for sure. This is the only suggestion that I have.

Another improvement maybe is not regarding the platform itself but more about the services. Okta Platform, especially in Europe where we are based, could improve the level of service. In some situations, I think it's not at the same level of the quality of the platform.

To receive a perfect score, Okta Platform should improve some support service level and maybe add some languages to the translation. These are some points where they can improve.

I started to work at Westcon in my role in March of 2021, so it's more than five years that I have this role and visibility about Okta Platform and the cybersecurity market.

We work as a distributor and all our partners and customers use Okta Platform, so that's really useful because we can integrate easily to all the applications of our partners and customers, but also with the cybersecurity ecosystem of solutions like CrowdStrike and Zscaler that we use in our company.

The best thing that I'd like to share is the integration between Okta Platform and CrowdStrike, but also with other software that are standards. For example, we are Microsoft customers, but we don't use the identity of Microsoft; we prefer to use Okta Platform that has several integrations and an easy interface to configure all those aspects.

The positive thing is that Okta Platform is a software-as-a-service with a subscription model, making it really easy to use. If you need to add some employees, it's really easy to add in the interface. We have customers that use Okta Platform, and what they say about Okta Platform is that it's a standard of security, allowing them to integrate the solution to their applications. For example, if they are a software house or something similar, the integration with their own solutions is the best feature and the best aspect of Okta Platform compared to other competitors.

For sure, the security improved after implementing Okta Platform. Also, the timing for the delivery, as mentioned, was really easy, and today we can save a lot of time to log in and manage the identity to our standard cloud applications that we use. The improvement of the security is one of the most important aspects for us as a cybersecurity distribution company.

Another improvement is not regarding the platform itself but more about the services. Okta Platform, especially in Europe where we are based, could improve the level of service. In some situations, I think it's not at the same level of the quality of the platform.

At the moment we are not using those features of Okta Platform, but some customers of ours are using them, and I can say that overall, at a high level, Okta Platform is investing really well because they want to be a player that can support. To be honest, we are not using that at the moment.

Okta Platform is deployed in a public cloud in our organization, which is really important for us. Okta Platform is definitely helping us to improve the identity and access to the public cloud providers because we also use Microsoft Azure and AWS to provide services to our partners and customers. Setting Okta Platform and using Okta Platform as our identity platform solution is really important for us. I would rate this review an 8 out of 10.