Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center vs FireMon Security Manager comparison

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center and FireMon Security Manager based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Firewall Security Management solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
To learn more, read our detailed Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center vs. FireMon Security Manager Report (Updated: March 2024).
767,847 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"The most valuable features are the Virtual Private Network and the Electronic Control Lists.""The most valuable aspects are the antivirus and URL filtering.""The most valuable feature of the Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center is the UTM.""The solution is easy to use.""It is a stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.""One of the most valuable features of Cisco Secure Firewalls is their seamless integration with other Cisco products.""Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center is scalable.""My clients have never contacted me with any issues, so I believe the solution is stable."

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"The most valuable feature is that everything is recorded in the historical logs, including the firewall rules, headcounts, object-level usage, and the rule documentation. The rule certification details are also there, which means that someone can be held accountable for a specific firewall rule.""Vendor agnostic when it comes to integrating with other product.""The most valuable feature of FireMon is its ability to configure multiple devices and consolidate them into a single desktop, which allows us to manage all of our security devices, such as Palo Alto and Zscaler, from one place.""Policy test, access path analysis, and change reports.""FireMon saves us a lot of time and it's nice because if you're adding a rule that's similar to another rule, it'll tell you so sometimes you can just edit the one and add another source or destination in there without creating a duplicate rule. It enables you to consolidate and have fewer, more meaningful rules. We're saving around 30% of our time.""The most valuable features are the security assessments and the ability to identify unused rules or objects.""FireMon decreases errors and misconfigurations by 10% that increase risk in our environment. That has to do a lot with the change reporting that is in place, but also with the built-in controls and custom controls that we have made. Those all decrease the errors that people naturally make on a day-to-day basis for firewall administration.""The SQL language is convenient to use. It allows us to process a bunch of criteria very quickly and narrows things down if there is an issue with the firewall. It's easy to do that with SQL queries."

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Cons
"The initial setup is a bit complex.""The IOS and the deploy option could be improved.""The interface is an area that could be improved.""Areas for improvement include pricing points and the range of products available at any given time.""I had a challenging time trying to size the firewall on the cloud. Maybe the information is there, but I couldn't find it easily. Usually, it depends on the cloud provider itself, whether you use AWS or Azure. These guys give you the information, so this part is not as detailed.""The solution could improve the number of ports available and load balancing.""It takes five to seven minutes to push one policy.""Some duplicated values and security standards are not working in some high-application protocols with Cisco's next-generation firewalls."

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"The stability has been fairly decent, but there have been a few issues. My coworker has had some issues in the past where he has had to work with support.""We have not used the Policy Planner but even so, we have identified areas of improvement with it during our testing. For example, it could be better when it comes to ease of integration or ease of policy automation. Another problem is that there is a console where it has too many options and is not very straightforward. Essentially, controlling it could be made more seamless.""We've had recurring issues managing FireMon's internal backups. Sometimes, the space allocated for the backup is full, and there is no process where it deletes files that are older than I certain date. It's just waiting for the storage to get full and then it's cleaned up. It isn't something that creates serious issues for us.""Policy Planner requirements section is good, but could use some improvement to allow flexibility to enter different types of requests (modifying an existing policy, object or service group, for example) in a structured task format that can be auto-verified.""Some of the core functionality in our environment doesn't seem to work. We will get buggy code releases. They need to work on their Q&A of every code release.""While I like the reporting, I think that has the biggest room for improvement. Right now, as a user of FireMon, if I create a report, I am the only one who can see it inside FireMon. If someone on my team creates a report, they are the only person who can see that report on FireMon. It doesn't matter if you're admin in FireMon or not. The way we have to do it now is that we have created a service account user and that service account user runs all the reports. This way, all the reports, which are running, are just run under a single user so we can always access them. This definitely needs to change so users can see other users' reports or we can share reports within FireMon.""One area for 7.x customers that needs improvement is the migration. It is an involved process so get ready to spend some time getting your environment back to the way it was.""The advanced features are complex in setting up the rules."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "When you are using a Cisco solution you know it will be expensive. Cisco makes you pay for everything individually. We pay for the licenses that we need."
  • "Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center has the best price on the market."
  • "I rate Secure Firewall Management Center eight out of 10 for pricing."
  • "Technical support is an additional annual cost and is not included with the license."
  • "The price of the solution is expensive. We do not have to pay more than the standard licensing fees."
  • "It could be considered relatively cheaper when compared to some other vendors in the market."
  • "The solution’s pricing is reasonable."
  • "The solution is expensive. We have a multi-license, and we pay extra for support."
  • More Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "Pricing model seems fair."
  • "Relative to what it offers, the price is fair."
  • "The pricing is very good, very straightforward. It also came in cheaper than AlgoSec and Tufin."
  • "Regarding additional costs, if you want things like Policy Optimizer, extra features, that's extra."
  • "We don't license all of the devices in our network, so it does not provide us with a comprehensive visibility of all devices in a hybrid network at this time."
  • "We pay for it yearly."
  • "FireMon is cheaper than AlgoSec."
  • "Pricing is reasonable."
  • More FireMon Security Manager Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:One of the most valuable features of Cisco Secure Firewalls is their seamless integration with other Cisco products.
    Top Answer:One of the advantages of Cisco is its range of flexible licensing options. Whether customers are seeking a lighter version or a comprehensive feature set, Cisco offers various licensing tiers to… more »
    Top Answer:Areas for improvement include pricing points and the range of products available at any given time. Cisco could potentially address these aspects more effectively to better accommodate the needs of… more »
    Top Answer:What I like about FireMon is the ability to track changes made by network engineers on the network.
    Top Answer:It's a good value. From a licensing standpoint, our only limitation is the number of devices that we manage. Our environment is small. We have fewer than 20 enterprise firewalls, meaning it's hard to… more »
    Top Answer:FireMon could be made more user-friendly when it comes to creating filters or conducting traffic analysis.
    Ranking
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    13
    Average Words per Review
    497
    Rating
    7.9
    Views
    7,041
    Comparisons
    5,286
    Reviews
    7
    Average Words per Review
    1,117
    Rating
    8.6
    Comparisons
    Learn More
    Overview

    The Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center is the administrative nerve center for select Cisco security products running on multiple platforms. It provides unified management of Cisco Secure Firewalls with Firewall Threat Defense (FTD) software for port and protocol control, application control, IPS, URL filtering, and malware protection functions. Firewall Management Center is the centralized event and policy manager for:

    ● Cisco Secure Firewall with the Firewall Threat Defense (FTD) OS

    ● Cisco ASA with FirePOWER Services

    ● Cisco Secure IPS (Firepower Next-Gen IPS / NGIPS)

    ● Cisco FirePOWER Threat Defense for ISR

    ● Cisco Malware Defense (AMP)

    The increasing complexity of networks, driven by the constant influx of new devices, applications, and cloud services, presents a daunting challenge for managing firewall policies and rules. A typical enterprise environment has millions of rules, and just one simple misconfiguration can lead to devastating consequences like compliance violations, outages, and data breaches. 

    FireMon’s Security Manager is a purpose-built network security policy management (NSPM) platform that automates the management of firewall and cloud security policies to eliminate policy-related risk, accurately and quickly change rules, and meet internal and external compliance requirements.

    • Reduce Risk Manage risk with real-time visibility and control
    • Manage Change Avoid misconfigurations, accelerate business, and improve security
    • Enforce and Maintain Compliance Avoid violations, avoid risk, and avoid fines
    Sample Customers
    Information Not Available
    Convey, MGM Resorts International, Southwest Airlines, Alkami, Costco, Aetna, IBM, Verizon, Wells Fargo
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Computer Software Company31%
    Comms Service Provider23%
    Financial Services Firm15%
    Manufacturing Company8%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company20%
    Government17%
    Financial Services Firm15%
    Engineering Company6%
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm29%
    Insurance Company9%
    Government9%
    Computer Software Company7%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company19%
    Financial Services Firm13%
    Manufacturing Company6%
    Comms Service Provider6%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business37%
    Midsize Enterprise32%
    Large Enterprise32%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business22%
    Midsize Enterprise8%
    Large Enterprise70%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business14%
    Midsize Enterprise15%
    Large Enterprise71%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business19%
    Midsize Enterprise14%
    Large Enterprise67%
    Buyer's Guide
    Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center vs. FireMon Security Manager
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center vs. FireMon Security Manager and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
    767,847 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center is ranked 7th in Firewall Security Management with 18 reviews while FireMon Security Manager is ranked 4th in Firewall Security Management with 53 reviews. Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center is rated 8.0, while FireMon Security Manager is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center writes "A stable and reasonably priced product that protects organizations from malware". On the other hand, the top reviewer of FireMon Security Manager writes "Makes compliance much easier compared to doing it manually, and automates policy changes across environments". Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center is most compared with AWS Firewall Manager and Palo Alto Networks Panorama, whereas FireMon Security Manager is most compared with Tufin Orchestration Suite, AlgoSec, Skybox Security Suite, Palo Alto Networks Panorama and AWS Firewall Manager. See our Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center vs. FireMon Security Manager report.

    See our list of best Firewall Security Management vendors.

    We monitor all Firewall Security Management reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.