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FortiSASE vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps 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
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (5th), Internet Security (3rd), Web Content Filtering (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (7th), ZTNA as a Service (7th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (8th)
FortiSASE
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
5.3
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (6th)
Microsoft Defender for Clou...
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (5th), Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (14th), Microsoft Security Suite (11th)
 

Mindshare comparison

Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
FortiSASE7.6%
Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks11.8%
Cato SASE Cloud Platform9.8%
Other70.8%
Secure Access Service Edge (SASE)
Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps6.0%
Netskope14.4%
Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks14.3%
Other65.3%
Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2701851 - PeerSpot reviewer
Managing Director
Enhances web security with a single pane of glass and flexible deployment
I don't see any need for improvement; one of the really good things about iboss as a company is that they listen to customer feedback. I have suggested enhancements, and they are responsive, making changes for the better, and they do a lot of testing. To improve iboss, although we haven't used it, we considered the VPN solution that comes with the highest tier licensing, which includes DLP and various other add-ons. We prefer using another product which automatically logs you back onto your network when turning on your PC. With iboss, the connection is manual, which doesn't meet our needs. Additionally, sizing can be tricky because, although the initial recommendations may seem adequate, actual usage may require more gateways than anticipated.
LK
Head Vice President, Delivery at Gehnax Technologies LLP
Implementation complexity challenges are addressed and bundled solution offers significant ROI
For other solutions such as FortiAnalyzer and FortiSIEM, integration is easy, but it's not straightforward due to license complexity. As FortiSASE is new in the market in India, if you want to use a Delhi data center, you need a separate license, and if you have a different kind of firewall, you cannot transfer your license from one box to another box. FortiSASE implementation is too complex where other products take two to three months or maximum four months to implement, FortiSASE took more than double that time. The product appears to have been launched without being tested properly in real market conditions. While testing may have been done in lab environments, real-time scenarios seem to be missing from this solution. The SPA licenses are limited to the box UTM, UTM make and model. If someone has a UTM currently and plans to upgrade or downgrade in the coming year after procuring the SPA license for three years, they cannot transfer those licenses to another box, which is a challenge that needs improvement.
FV
Security and Continuity Manager at Rolinco NV
Deployment has been seamless with insightful data categorization and enhanced control
The features of Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps that I have found most valuable include the overall portal view, with bubble graphs which give us insight into what goes where in the categorization, nowadays with Generative AI but all kinds of categorization, collaboration, etc. That central view of the portal is very useful for us. The impact of Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps on our organization's ability to assess and manage app related risks has been significant because we have more visibility. Therefore, we can add more control, and we have already done so. This was not possible in the old solution, in the old CASB solution with Netskope. We now can see on the spot, and we do that almost weekly, what the end users are utilizing, which cloud providers or cloud apps they're using. The visibility into OAuth apps provided by Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is very good. The visibility into risk and risk management of our organization's Generative AI apps is very nice, as you can choose the category Generative AI and then see exactly what traffic has been going to and from Generative AI in the cloud. This makes us very insightful on what is used within the company. We have some policies on blocking specific Generative AI, and we use within our company one particular AI part, which is CoPilot of Microsoft. In this way, we can see what the end users are using other than CoPilot, and that makes us more in control. The effectiveness of the integration of Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps with Defender XDR and defending against SaaS attacks is very intuitive. It works immediately if we create a new policy or in Purview or in Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps, or when we make an app unsanctioned by blocking it, then it is almost immediately, or at least within a couple of hours, effective on all the endpoints where the EDR is running. This gives us much better control over things than before.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution has massively improved our security posture, giving us full visibility into what our staff does online."
"Because of iboss, I did not have to assign web filtering tasks to my techs on a daily basis."
"Content filtering is the most useful feature of iboss."
"Granular setup, which was able to set different levels of filters using the OUs in the AD."
"The console is cloud-based, which is something I really appreciate."
"iboss is among the few products providing inline filtering where no application is needed on the device."
"Valuable features: Within the filter: Controls (Web categories, applications, and Allow/Block list) and Network (local Subnets). Within the reporter: Logs (Event Log) and Reports."
"The security aspect of the solution, particularly the malware behind it, is excellent. That's something that really helped us out. It's not just a simple proxy that just blocks the insights of potential threats that come on behind it. They do malware detection and that helps us a lot."
"This advantage is having the ability to create an SPA unit of FortiGate."
"Overall, I'd rate the product eight out of ten."
"The solution is easy to deploy and simple to manage."
"The integration with the company's existing security infrastructure enhanced our security posture since it was a straightforward process."
"Deep packet inspection is easier to deploy in the FortiSASE environment. It's much simpler to configure one-touch deployment. It was considerably more convoluted to get that to work using FortiClient. All that processing horsepower is happening in Fortinet's cloud infrastructure, reducing the load on our local routers and on-prem FortiGate firewalls."
"The solution is scalable, it is highly scalable."
"It has AI-based detections for any signature-less virus or any unknown vulnerabilities."
"We utilize the web filtering part of FortiCASB for our network security."
"From a security monitoring perspective, there is a productivity improvement and fewer human errors."
"The integration within the entire Defender suite is highly valuable because it allows for communication between different components and offers pretty decent correlations."
"Shadow IT discovery is the feature I like the most."
"Defender's integration with our identity solutions is critical in our current setup."
"Defender for Cloud Apps has given us good visibility regarding what we've allowed into our environment until now."
"I like the alert policies because they are quite robust. It has some built-in templates that we can easily pick up. One of them is the alert for mass downloads, when a particular user is running a massive download on your SharePoint site."
"It has helped identify areas where we should improve, make changes to improve, the reason why we should make a change, and the impact of making the change."
"It's very easy to install and it includes the Intune portal from Microsoft where I can control all the devices from one place."
 

Cons

"The reporting feature needs improvement. It doesn't give you the expected results. It is quite difficult to get the specific reports needed, and it is not as intuitive as the rest of the platform."
"I'd like to see them accelerate development on the security side, particularly around data loss prevention."
"File integrity monitoring would be very advantageous as an additional feature."
"Iboss is growing so fast that it is often hard for them to keep up with the challenges."
"SSL decryption: We had issues with learners using apps instead of using web browsers."
"It is stable, but due to growth, it can sometimes be less stable than wanted."
"Our biggest problem with their service was it did not recognize the device and filtering did not always work correctly."
"I am currently doing a PoC of the zero trust aspect of it. Compared to other similar solutions, it is hard to get around each feature. It takes a while to get used to it."
"Improvements should focus on security."
"While connectivity from outside to inside is okay, inside to outside is not."
"The current high-tech version of FortiSASE is not recommended due to its heavy loading."
"There were some difficulties with updating, and the solution is expensive."
"FortiSASE is an expensive product and the cost is indeed high."
"There are some issues at the agent level, and then we have to sign out and sign in."
"FortiSASE is a work in progress. One area where there is room for improvement is the ability to use FortiSASE on an endpoint that doesn't have the client on it. Other solutions do that by building a VPN tunnel from their on-prem router into the SASE environment. FortiSASE doesn't have that feature yet, but it is on the roadmap for Q3 of this year. I've seen it in their development environment."
"Some of the solution's back-end connectivity and visibility are not robust and could be improved."
"The graph displayed in the Defender portal mostly doesn't capture the full picture as we see in endpoint-related or identity-related alerts; we can see a complete graph of what is happening there, but Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps still falls short in capturing that whole aspect in the graph."
"Sometimes, we'll get false positive alarms. For example, when a SharePoint path has no file sharing, but there is an external user, it will trigger an alarm that the file has been shared with an external user."
"We've had an issue where an in-session policy was not working."
"It doesn't actually decrease the time to respond. This has been an issue with Microsoft recently. Sometimes, there is a delay when it comes to getting an alert policy email... Sometimes it takes two or three hours for that email to be sent."
"The integration with macOS operating systems needs to be better."
"The areas of Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps that need improvement are related to IAM, as they do not provide much support for local users."
"I would like for it to be available on Mac and for it to support all of the features of Microsoft financing products."
"I want them to enhance in-session policy."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."
"It is probably in line with other solutions, but I do not deal with the financial side."
"We have not priced the solution recently, but they were competitive with other vendors in the past."
"It is expensive compared to one of its competitors."
"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."
"I rate the product price an eight on a scale of one to ten, where one is high price, and ten is low price."
"I rate the product's price a six on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price and ten is high price."
"I can only speak about the pricing for education users because we get discounts. Other users aren't going to get the same price, but FortiSASE is competitive with the other products out there. All the solutions came in at the same price, so it just came down to the product that works best for us."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a three out of ten."
"Where we are right now, this is an acceptable pricing. I would like to see more transparency given to the end user. The end user given to us is via the cloud service provider. There are different programs and license models. Some include this, and some include that. It is all over the place. There can be a little more consistency or simplification in the pricing so that your parts list is not ten pages long, and you are not trying to determine, "If I have an E3, does this cover that?", or "Do I need to pay separately for the license?" Simplification would probably be better."
"The pricing is in the middle. It isn't too cheap or expensive compared to other antivirus or security products. It is priced according to industry standards."
"The cost could be improved when you need to pay for anything. For example, refreshing files takes time to load, though it may be my Internet. To improve the refresh time, Microsoft says that we need to pay for a Premium license, and I don't like paying for things that help make a solution better."
"The pricing is a little bit high but right now, we are okay with it because of the compatibility with Office 365, Teams, and Azure AD."
"This product is not expensive."
"Our clients normally use the Microsoft E1 licensing, which is renewed yearly."
"It is a little bit expensive. When you want to have the complete package with Office 365, Defender, and everything else, it is expensive."
"We have an educational licensing agreement. It's a customer agreement for multiple years."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Construction Company
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Construction Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise5
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business15
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise19
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with iboss?
For zero trust implementation, we encountered complexity issues, especially with a large infrastructure company Exxon...
What is your primary use case for iboss?
Previously when I used iboss, we did the POC for iboss for ExxonMobil. Four or five people wanted to move from our ol...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for iboss?
Regarding pricing, setup costs, and licensing, iboss is not cheap, and that's my only concern. There are cheaper alte...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for FortiSASE ?
The pricing, licensing, and setup costs of FortiSASE are very advantageous if you are already a Fortinet customer. If...
What needs improvement with FortiSASE ?
Areas of FortiSASE that could be improved or enhanced in future releases are related to being more open to supporting...
What is your primary use case for FortiSASE ?
FortiSASE is typically used by customers with two major concerns: many branches or stores and sometimes remote worker...
Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Microsoft Cloud App Security?
Cisco Umbrella is an integral component of the Cisco SASE architecture. It integrates security in a single, cloud-nat...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Cloud App Security?
At the time of implementation, when the size of our organization was small, it was a more affordable product. Since a...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Cloud App Security?
The fidelity of the signal in Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps has been a challenge in some areas. There have been i...
 

Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform
No data available
MS Cloud App Security, Microsoft Cloud App Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

More than 4,000 global enterprises trust the iboss Cloud Platform to support their modern workforces, including a large number of Fortune 50 companies.
Information Not Available
Customers for Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps include Accenture, St. Luke’s University Health Network, Ansell, and Nakilat.
Find out what your peers are saying about FortiSASE vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps and other solutions. Updated: May 2023.
885,376 professionals have used our research since 2012.