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Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise vs Cisco Web Security Appliance comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

iboss
Sponsored
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
6th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
Internet Security (3rd), Web Content Filtering (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (6th), ZTNA as a Service (6th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (7th)
Akamai Secure Internet Acc...
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
21st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
5.3
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Domain Name System (DNS) Security (11th)
Cisco Web Security Appliance
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
20th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Secure Web Gateways (SWG) category, the mindshare of iboss is 3.2%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise is 1.3%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Web Security Appliance is 2.2%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
iboss3.2%
Cisco Web Security Appliance2.2%
Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise1.3%
Other93.3%
Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
 

Featured Reviews

Ashok Ananthula - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Consultant Proxy Engineering at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Cloud gateway has strengthened remote web security and now needs better Mac and ISP support
The problem our organization had is that iboss failed for the Mac devices. It is not able to give a successful agent for the Mac agents. That is where in 2025, we had to migrate to the Palo Alto-based platform. If your use case is for just Windows laptops,you can consider this platform as an option One issue is the data center resiliency part. In India especially, they are not tied up with the Tier 1 ISPs like Tata or Airtel; they were having Tier 2 ISPs and encountered many issues reaching few major sites that my organization depends on, and they were having problems that they could not fix quickly. They also lack a mechanism to route that traffic within their data center; rather, they ask customers to make a pac file change to route it to Singapore explicitly. It would be better if they route from their backend , i mean even if I send it to India DC, they should be able to route it internally to make that work; however, they fail to do that and ask the customer to route it in the pac file. Another suggestion is that in China, they do not have the proper setup; they used to have numerous problems with slowness and lack of premium circuits in China as well. That leads to multiple sites working slowly with latency-related issues. So the main issue is the ISP-related problems that need to be solved.
MS
Senior Analyst at Deloitte
Have successfully routed high-volume application traffic through secure channels and maintain compliance across client environments
CDN capability is what I appreciate about Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise. It protects applications that are internet-facing or public-facing. Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise is a product which has very good features and capabilities. I have worked on Radware also, but Radware has some limited capabilities. Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise has positively impacted my organization. We have around 62 applications within our firm which are now routing traffic through Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise. It has fewer false positives, which is something we haven't encountered yet. I assess the impact of Akamai's real-time threat filtering as 10 out of 10, and I am satisfied with this feature.
Vusa Ndlovu - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Solution Architect at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees
Advanced protection features offer robust security while integration process presents challenges
With the WebAssign integration, it is not easy when I am integrating policies within the company, especially with NAND and wireless policies. The challenge arises when traffic is blocked from either wireless or wired connections. Although implementing it as a standalone is quicker, integrating BYOD with Cisco I and FTB can be tiring. Once it is done correctly, the functionality and reports become valuable, although the implementation part can still be challenging.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"I would rate the technical support of iboss a solid 10 without a shadow of a doubt."
"I would definitely recommend iboss for web filtering purposes to other organizations or individuals."
"We chose iboss for both zero trust and proxy (SWG) because their SWG was superior."
"Technical support is pretty sharp and very responsive."
"From a use-case scenario, what I like the most is the plug-in. I like the fact that we can do the filtering of these devices offsite independent of the network they are connected to, and we do not have to have traffic coming back inside our network."
"From a corporate perspective, I understand that it's important to keep the company data safe."
"The console is cloud-based, which is something I really appreciate."
"The students were always protected, and the content filtering worked very well, seeming to work better than other products we had tried previously."
"The threat intelligence feature is particularly valuable when used with another product of Akamai, as their researchers continuously update this threat feed database, making it an effective tool for defending against and blocking bad actors, public malicious IPs, harmful hashes, and malicious URLs."
"The best feature of Akamai SPS Threat Avert is that it's very user-friendly compared to other technologies."
"Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise is a product which has very good features and capabilities."
"Through my years working with Cisco, I would always recommend Cisco, any product that they provide, thanks to my years of experience."
"This solution offers categorization for YouTube and other specific applications from Facebook to WhatsApp, which can be controlled whether it's on mobile or PC."
"It operates well, however, the on-premises version is limited in terms of scaling."
"The WCCP is good at delivering HTTP and HTTPS traffic."
"Since working with the tool, we have not found any threats in our organization."
"The most valuable features is of the solution is that it is user-friendly and we get good web security from it."
"It's very scalable; if you buy one bundle with 100 users, you can install unlimited appliances to scale horizontally and have ten appliances that can log share communications."
"It integrates well with Cisco Email Security Appliance."
 

Cons

"Sometimes the agent stops working in iboss, and we have to reinstall the agent."
"I have heard they are doing DDoS filtering, but I am not certain if they are implementing it correctly."
"The dashboards for local use could be better."
"I'd like to see them accelerate development on the security side, particularly around data loss prevention."
"The area I would like to see improvement in is the ability with in the reporter to navigate directly to the content the user is traversing. It is kind of there, but it's not perfect. Quite frequently, I receive links that lead me to pages with error messages."
"If they could implement an extra security layer preventing access to iboss from the open internet, it would be great."
"iboss can be improved because the integration could be better; you need to import all the sites that you access today, and there are a few problems whenever you import thousands of websites, making the integration process messy for the users."
"Iboss is growing so fast that it is often hard for them to keep up with the challenges."
"Akamai SPS Threat Avert's pricing could be improved because it's a very expensive enterprise solution."
"From a financial standpoint, I do not believe Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise is cost-effective when compared to other solutions available in the industry."
"Their support response time needs improvement. They take on average one week to respond, which is not satisfactory given how critical applications are to the organization."
"There are certain shortcomings related to the product's management capabilities, where improvements are required. The solution needs to provide better management of the category of web pages."
"If a user wants to use it for other devices like mobile or smartphones, this product isn't so reliable."
"The pricing is too high, so that could be improved."
"The reporting needs improvement."
"During the setup, we had issues with updating the rules."
"I would like more automation."
"Sometimes reporting is a little bit short."
"This solution could be more secure."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is probably in line with other solutions, but I do not deal with the financial side."
"The overall pricing for iboss is very competitive and transparent."
"It is not expensive, and it is also not cheap. iboss is priced right in the sweet spot for the number of features it offers."
"It is expensive compared to one of its competitors."
"We had the cost of purchasing a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs. However, the following year, the cost of just licensing was similar to what was paid the previous year for a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs."
"We have not priced the solution recently, but they were competitive with other vendors in the past."
"Provided the features Akamai SPS Threat Avert provides, it is bound to be expensive."
"At the time, licensing fees were paid on an annual basis."
"When you compare the price of this solution to the price of FortiGate, it's high."
"Cisco Web Security Appliance is not the cheapest solution on the market, but it's well worth it."
"There is a subscription-based license needed to use this solution."
"Licensing fees are based on the number of users."
"I rate Cisco WSA a seven out of ten since it is costly."
"I know from the manager that the price is too high and that other solutions offer the same features for less."
"The solution's cost depends on how many users you purchase. It was maybe $3 or $5 per user, which is a bit expensive."
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Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Secure Web Gateways (SWG) solutions are best for your needs.
915,341 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Construction Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Construction Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
25%
Construction Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise11
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise12
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with iboss?
I think iboss could be improved by making reporting and dashboard customization more flexible, and simplifying troubl...
What is your primary use case for iboss?
I use iboss as a cloud-based secure web gateway to provide secure internet access, web filtering, and protect remote ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for iboss?
My experience with iboss's pricing structure, setup cost, and licensing model has been positive, straightforward, and...
What needs improvement with Akamai SPS Threat Avert?
Since Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise is not being used in our campus environment, as our users do not route...
What is your primary use case for Akamai SPS Threat Avert?
Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise is designed to protect users' access to the internet.
What advice do you have for others considering Akamai SPS Threat Avert?
Our organization does not utilize the internet access feature of Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise because our...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Web Security Appliance?
Comparing with other products, Cisco has more functionality, but pricing is a challenge. Cisco is not a product for s...
What needs improvement with Cisco Web Security Appliance?
With the WebAssign integration, it is not easy when I am integrating policies within the company, especially with NAN...
What is your primary use case for Cisco Web Security Appliance?
The user interface that I usually provide for the web app includes malware protection, URL filtering, data loss preve...
 

Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform
Akamai Enterprise Threat Protector, Akamai ETP, Akamai SPS Threat Avert
Cisco WSA, Cisco Web Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Trusted by global enterprises and government agencies.
MCNC, Educational Testing Service
New South Wales Rural Fire Service, Caixa Seguradora
Find out what your peers are saying about Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise vs. Cisco Web Security Appliance and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
915,341 professionals have used our research since 2012.