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AlienVault OSSIM vs USM Anywhere comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

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

AlienVault OSSIM
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
10th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
USM Anywhere
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
33rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
115
Ranking in other categories
Log Management (42nd), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (52nd), Compliance Management (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) category, the mindshare of AlienVault OSSIM is 4.2%, up from 3.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of USM Anywhere is 1.0%, down from 2.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

Aman Aijaz - PeerSpot reviewer
An easy-to-scale open-source solution used for monitoring events on devices
The area for improvement is a lot. When I started using it on our enterprise side, the issue we faced was, for example, if we were running at that time on AlienVault OSSIM v5.7.4. So, for some orders, we had to install some packages, and when we tried installing that package, some dependencies got upgraded to a new version. Now once that dependency got upgraded, the SQL, since you might be aware that OSSIM uses SQL database, now SQL and all the dependency in everything was not on the same version, and that caused the database to crash. The aforementioned area should be eased out by upgrading the patches and upgrading dependencies. This kind of thing is a disadvantage of OSSIM, and I would like them to work on this. But I have also raised service requests many times and gave it a push on the community section too. However, since it is a local source, they don't reply much over there. That is why I don't like to work on OSSIM because it is unpredictable. Once the storage goes above 50 percent, it starts behaving unpredictably. If you get stuck with a situation, then you need to drill a lockdown into that. Sometimes you get no luck. Then you have to just reimage the server with the new fresh OS of AlienVault. As for additional features, not much because if you move to the newer version, it is kind of getting more stable. But, to make my life easier, then I would say try to give more features. I know it's open source, so they also cannot provide me with more features. But still, if they can provide me with more features because right now it's becoming old. Right now, we are even moving from SIEM to Security Data Lake. So when we move to it, this will be literally outdated. No one can even expect anything out of it. The way security is moving, it will be outdated very soon. They have to also provide something new to keep this going for the future also.
Kris Nawani - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers complete coverage without the need to install additional software
USM Anywhere is used for threat detection and investigation. It provides a solution with built-in threat intelligence and various other investigation tools The solution offers complete coverage without the need to install additional software, as it is maintained by the vendor. It helps in saving…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The threat policies of the solution are always very advanced and the best in the market. They are very persistent in terms of keeping up with security protocols."
"Its user-friendliness is the most valuable. It is very easy to use and explore. The dashboard is very well packaged and integrated. You don't have to spend a lot of time in configuring it and checking out the RPM etc. It is also free and very powerful."
"There are a lot of people you will find using OSSIM since they are also offering OTX as a service"
"Inbuilt IDS, inbuilt integration with threat intelligence platform and with vulnerability assessment modules."
"The initial setup was straightforward. I didn't have any problems."
"I recommend it due to the experience of the people running it."
"You pay monthly for the solution. I think it's one of the best products. If you compare with other companies, like LogRhythm, etc., the top 8 or 10 CMs, I think Alien Vault has the best price-performance ratio."
"The threat alerts it gives me from time to time on harmful code within the network, or if they are generating any network traffic, are very useful."
"The vulnerability manager and the file integration are very good."
"What I find the most valuable about USM Anywhere is its compliance. It shows a list of all the administrators logged on and does it quite well. There are no whistles and bells, it's reliable and simple to use."
"This solution can identify many threats inside the organization (compromised endpoints, configuration issues), as well as "outside" threats (botnets, network scanners, web-attacks, etc)."
"There are multiple tools for information security. The solution includes all the latest advances on the network and host intrusion detection systems."
"Having everything in a central place has been helpful."
"Easy to use, scalable, stable, and very intuitive platform that provides protection against security threats."
"AlientVault has helped us in improving our visualization and incident response during cybersecurity situations."
"The AlienVault solution has enabled us to create a SOC on a budget with smaller than usual staff requirements, offering a wider range of solutions for our customers."
 

Cons

"AlienVault OSSIM gives unwanted notifications."
"The incidence reporting could be better."
"Lacking in depth of reporting."
"It's under heavy traffic. If you have heavy traffic, the system is slow."
"The user interface could be improved."
"There needs to be more support or some kind of training program so users can self-learn the system more effectively."
"The initial setup was a bit complex. You've got to do a lot of reading. It's not an intuitive implementation."
"The price of this solution is very high and it could be cheaper."
"It was easy on PoC, but when we got to the product it was different story. We had to learn the product again and got feeling that the PoC was a different product."
"We've had some stability problems, not a lot, but a few. Updates seem to be the worst. That seems to be when the stability problems come up."
"The price of AT&T AlienVault USM could be reduced."
"The UI and overall processes need a little bit more love. This shows in the error banners that come up when you select certain things. There isn't a day that goes by that the UI doesn't error out and I can't view events for an alarm."
"For creating new rules, you have to be familiar with regular expressions. I feel there could be something built-in to make sure that process is easier."
"AlienVault cannot automatically respond to threats like other SIEM solutions, such as Sentinel and LogRhythm. Most of our clients are far away, so it's often challenging to handle alerts when they come up on our dashboard."
"Source material on the forums to be more up-to-date with the changes happening within the product. Forums being out-of-date with information due to the changes makes troubleshooting a little more difficult - specific to the HIDS agents."
"It should be able to communicate with other security solutions to stop threats."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"AlienVault OSSIM is an open-source solution."
"The solution is open source, so it's free to use."
"OSSIM is free."
"AlienVault pricing is the best. Whatever cost you are paying, you are getting a return on every penny... It's not like your IBM, your QRadar, or Splunk, where the cost is too high."
"The price of AlienVault OSSIM is too high sometimes for us to present to our customers. The price should be lower. We are on a three-year license to use the solution. We had to pay extra for the support."
"When comparing AlienVault OSSIM to Microsoft Sentinel, AlienVault OSSIM incurs additional costs due to its licensing price structure. If you are using AlienVault for security purposes at a certain level it can have a higher price point than the current pricing of Microsoft Sentinel."
"The licensing fees for the non-community edition are paid on an annual basis, and there are no costs in addition to this."
"AlienVault OSSIM is expensive compared to its competitors."
"I rate the price of AT&T AlienVault USM a four out of five."
"Pricing is very competitive with other products and you get much more functionality from AlienVault."
"We ran a few PoCs. The price and feature set were the best with AlienVault."
"The pricing is a good value. The key thing is that for the new product, the licensing of it, is subscription-based and it's based on data. Clients need to be really careful when thinking about that, because odds are they're going to need to put a lot more data into it than what they initially estimate, which is going to drive their subscription costs up."
"We checked out several competitors. For what it can do and the cost, it was the best option!"
"It has good pricing."
"Its price is in the medium to upper range."
"I don't know exactly, but I know it is based on the number of logs and the retention duration, such as 30 days or something like that. So, the smallest package is about 500 a month for 30 days of logs. There is a virtual machine. You need resources for it. It is a log collecting VM. They provide the software, and you just have to load a virtual machine. So, you're going to incur some CPU RAM and storage for wherever this log collecting appliance is running, which typically is in our cloud and on our platform for the customer."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Comms Service Provider
9%
University
7%
Computer Software Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Educational Organization
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AlienVault OSSIM?
It depends. I would need to review their cost models, but generally, they are on a scaled basis based on throughput usage. Because it's a software as a service solution for their core product for U...
What needs improvement with AlienVault OSSIM?
Scaling for USM is always challenging for any product unless it is purpose-built or overbuilt at the front end. They will use Palo Alto and its competitors, and LevelBlue will manage that implement...
What do you like most about AT&T AlienVault USM?
The most valuable feature of the solution is the ease of deployment that it provides to users. The integrations that the product has with third-party applications are useful.
What needs improvement with AT&T AlienVault USM?
There are scalability issues due to a 60 TB limit, which restricts its use for large customers like banks. It is also limited when used with bigger products and has complex password requirements.
 

Also Known As

OSSIM
AT&T AlienVault USM, AlienVault, AlienVault USM, Alienvault Cybersecurity
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Council Rock School District
Abel & Cole, Bank of Ireland, Bluegrass Cellular, CareerBuilder, Claire's, Hays Medical Center, Hope International, McCurrach, McKinsey & Company, Party Delights, Pepco Holdings, Richland School District, Ricoh, SaveMart, Shake Shack, Steelcase, TaxAct, Taylor Morrison, Vonage and Zoom
Find out what your peers are saying about AlienVault OSSIM vs. USM Anywhere and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
833,108 professionals have used our research since 2012.