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Arbor DDoS vs F5 Shape Security comparison

 

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

Arbor DDoS
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
53
Ranking in other categories
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (3rd)
F5 Shape Security
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Fraud Detection and Prevention (6th), Bot Management (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Security Services solutions, they serve different purposes. Arbor DDoS is designed for Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection and holds a mindshare of 13.7%, up 13.2% compared to last year.
F5 Shape Security, on the other hand, focuses on Fraud Detection and Prevention, holds 2.0% mindshare, down 2.4% since last year.
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection
Fraud Detection and Prevention
 

Featured Reviews

Leandro Di Maria - PeerSpot reviewer
Rapid attack detection and traffic visibility improve security management
The solution was intended for the big clients of Telefonica to clean their internet pipe. We deployed the service to clean the pipe. In some clients' data centers, we implemented a solution that detects and mitigates attacks using Arbor DDoS, our data center solution For me, the most valuable…
Nikolay Dimitrov - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to configure and blocks bot attacks for web users
The solution is deployed on the F5 cloud. The solution's real-time analytics help you see what has been blocked. It helps to see whether the attack category was an automation attack or a fake browser. F5 Shape Security has a normal dashboard. We are doing F5 Shape Security migrations for 30 customers. F5 Shape Security uses Javascript. For a lot of competitors, the Javascript can be reverse-engineered by attackers to bypass the protection. F5 Shape Security has machine learning authentication of the Java script. If you had hacked it, the encryption would have been changed. It's really hard for attackers to reverse engineer the F5 Shape Security JavaScript. Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is fully mitigating the attacks. We've dealt with other ones where we didn't necessarily see that. The detection is very good. It's also very simple to use. Arbor is a single pane of glass, whereas with other solutions you might have a detection pane of glass and then have to go to a separate interface to deal with the mitigation. That single pane of glass makes it much simpler."
"It has an easy-to-understand GUI...Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"Arbor has the ability to learn and self-create the appropriate profile for each customer."
"The solution is flexible, easy to implement and has an efficient technical support team."
"We use it not only for DDoS detection and protection, but we also use it for traffic analysis and capacity planning as well. We've also been able to extend the use of it to other security measures within our company, the front-line defense, not only for DDoS, but for any kind of scanning malware that may be picked up. It's also used for outbound attacks, which has helped us mitigate those and lower our bandwidth costs..."
"We use almost all the features of Arbor DDoS, but it really depends on the customer’s requirements, so I can’t specify exactly which features we use. However, many customers appreciate the basic DDoS protection, especially those without specific protection needs. For example, financial companies benefit from the cloud DDoS protection. It’s a straightforward solution that effectively meets their needs."
"I highly recommend Arbor DDoS to others."
"We can reduce the bandwidth to minimize the attack level. If we see more than 2.5 GBs we drop it directly."
"F5 Shape Security's most valuable feature is performance."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is the ease of configuration."
 

Cons

"I have observed that the SNMP traps aspect that sends information to third-party solutions needs improvement."
"There is definitely room for improvement in third-party intelligence and integrations."
"The look and feel of the management console is a little old, excessively simple. If you compare it with other solutions, the look and feel of the console is like you're using technology from five or six years ago. It doesn't show all the technology that is actually behind it. It looks like an older solution, even though it is not."
"When it comes to some false positives, we need to tweak the system from time to time. There is room for improvement when it comes to the actual mitigation because of some false positives."
"An improvement would be to provide information on how pricing is done on different customer levels."
"It is an expensive product, so there is room for improvement in terms of pricing."
"I think the diversity of protection is extremely limited. It must be expanded in future upgrades and versions."
"The solution needs to enhance its features to compete with other tools."
"I want the solution's custom exclusion rules to be more granular."
"The tool's price is high."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Arbor is striking a good balance between pricing and what they deliver."
"I believe that the price of Arbor DDoS falls under the bracket of medium to high price."
"Pricing is slightly on the higher side."
"Our customers always complain about the price of the product."
"The solution's pricing is based on a licensing model that is expensive when compared to other tools."
"I don't deal with the pricing, but it seems that you need to get basic support in order to upgrade the software and implement some patches."
"Regarding pricing, I would rate it as average. Arbor DDoS offers good value for money with our DDoS filter device. For higher protection needs, Arbor’s CloudMeter’s DDoS mitigation or hardware devices might be more expensive, but customers who need them are usually prepared for the cost and the additional resources required."
"Start with a small license. Measure your bandwidth requirements."
"The solution is moderately priced."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
31%
Retailer
8%
Healthcare Company
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?
I would say if it’s an ISP that will build a scrubbing center, Netscout/Arbor is a good solution. In all other solutions, Imperva is a great choice.
Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?
Arbor would be the best bid, apart from Arbor, Palo Alto and Fortinet have good solutions. As this is an ISP, I would prefer Arbor.
What do you like most about Arbor DDoS?
The quality of the technical support provided by Arbor DDoS is premium.
What makes automation distinct as an attack vector?
An aspect that sets automation apart as an attack vector is its ability to mimic legitimate user behavior and evade traditional security measures. Automated attacks can simulate human-like interact...
How does F5 Shape Security’s system work? What are its components?
One key component is the Shape Defense Engine. It sends telemetry to the Shape AI Cloud, a highly secure data system where machine learning algorithms analyze the data to detect patterns of automat...
Can F5 Shape Security protect both our web and mobile applications? Are there any specific features for mobile app protection?
F5 Shape Security can protect web apps as well. It’s a bit complicated, but goes something like this: The platform employs a JavaScript-based collection of client signals to gather data on user beh...
 

Also Known As

Arbor Networks SP, Arbor Networks TMS, Arbor Cloud for ENT
Shape Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Xtel Communications
Wells Fargo, Loblaw, JetBlue, Zoosk
Find out what your peers are saying about Cloudflare, Radware, NETSCOUT and others in Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection. Updated: June 2025.
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