IBM Security QRadar and Microsoft Defender XDR compete in the cybersecurity domain. Microsoft Defender XDR seems to have the upper hand with its robust threat intelligence capabilities and integration within the Microsoft ecosystem.
Features:IBM Security QRadar is noted for log management and scalability, enabling integration with various data sources for efficient information extraction and log analysis, aiding compliance monitoring. Meanwhile, Microsoft Defender XDR excels in threat intelligence capabilities, enhanced by built-in identity and access management. Its coordinated detection and response further strengthen security with advanced threat analytics.
Room for Improvement:IBM Security QRadar needs better automation and integration with IBM products and third-party solutions. Its complex interface would benefit from improvements in dashboards and navigation, as well as increased customization flexibility. Microsoft Defender XDR would benefit from improved seamless integration between its components and enhanced customization features. Simplifying the user interface and clarifying licensing would increase usability and flexibility across different environments.
Ease of Deployment and Customer Service:IBM Security QRadar primarily deploys on-premises or hybrid setups but receives mixed reviews for its technical support, often with long response times. In contrast, Microsoft Defender XDR smoothly integrates within the Microsoft ecosystem, mainly deploying in cloud environments. Despite generally robust support, some complexity still requires simplification for the end-users.
Pricing and ROI:IBM Security QRadar is considered expensive due to its event-per-second licensing model, with favorable ROI contingent on adequate utilization and infrastructure investment. Microsoft Defender XDR offers competitive bundled pricing within the Microsoft 365 suite, although high costs prevail without discounts. However, its integrated security and operational management capabilities provide substantial value and strong ROI.
With SOAR, the workflow takes one minute or less to complete the analysis.
Investing this amount was very much worth it for my organization.
We can quarantine and isolate a device within minutes.
Microsoft Defender XDR has saved me at least 50% of my time.
Ever since we turned on the M5 feature set back in June, we have seen a reduced number of potentially malicious clicks and faster alerting when incidents occur.
They assist with advanced issues, such as hardware or other problems, that are not part of standard operations.
Support needs to understand the issue first, then escalate it to the engineering team.
The support is really good; for instance, if a critical ticket is submitted, you will get paged right away as it gets logged, and their analyst will look into it, letting you know as soon as possible so you can work on it.
You get stuck in low-level support for way longer than you should, instead of them escalating the issue up the chain.
It's critical to escalate SEV B issues immediately to a domestic engineer.
Once issues are escalated to the second or third layer, the support is much better.
For EPS license, if you increase or exceed the EPS license, you cannot receive events.
Microsoft Defender XDR shows tremendous scalability, much more so than on-premises solutions.
Microsoft Defender XDR scales pretty well.
It is suitable for enterprise-level deployment but has room for improvement.
I think QRadar is stable and currently satisfies my needs.
The product has been stable so far.
The service has remained consistently online, with any issues isolated to specific components, suggesting a well-designed and modular architecture.
The services within our ecosystem have been reliable, meeting their SLAs.
It provides high-fidelity signals.
We receive logs from different types of devices and need a way to correlate them effectively.
If AI-related support can suggest rules and integrate with existing security devices like MD, IPS, this SIM can create more relevant rules.
IBM Security QRadar does not support Canvas, so we had to create custom scripts and workarounds to pull logs from Canvas.
The licensing process needs improvement and clarification.
Improvements are needed in automated response capabilities.
Some inconsistencies exist between blades, which could be improved for a more seamless user and UI experience.
Splunk is more expensive than IBM Security QRadar.
There are certainly savings when using Microsoft Defender XDR, which can range from 30%, 40%, and even up to 50%.
I would rate the pricing as eight out of ten, indicating it is a reasonable cost for the product.
Microsoft purposefully obfuscates this through marketing ploys to hide costs.
Recently, I faced an incident, a cyber incident, and it was detected in real time.
IBM is seeking information about IBM QRadar because a part of QRadar, especially in the cloud, has been sold to Palo Alto.
We have FortiSOAR and IBM Resilient for IBM Security QRadar orchestration.
With Microsoft threat intelligence information, it detects various types of threats, including insider attacks, malicious content, and data exfiltration.
This allows us to secure our systems in advance and proactively improve security, rather than waiting for incidents to occur.
Once we have it on the security dashboard, we can see a real-time storyline.
| Product | Market Share (%) |
|---|---|
| Microsoft Defender XDR | 6.1% |
| IBM Security QRadar | 3.5% |
| Other | 90.4% |
| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 88 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 36 |
| Large Enterprise | 102 |
| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 46 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 23 |
| Large Enterprise | 37 |
IBM Security QRadar (recently acquired by Palo Alto Networks) is a security and analytics platform designed to defend against threats and scale security operations. This is done through integrated visibility, investigation, detection, and response. QRadar empowers security groups with actionable insights into high-priority threats by providing visibility into enterprise security data. Through centralized visibility, security teams and analysts can determine their security stance, which areas pose a potential threat, and which areas are critical. This will help streamline workflows by eliminating the need to pivot between tools.
IBM Security QRadar is built to address a wide range of security issues and can be easily scaled with minimal customization effort required. As data is ingested, QRadar administers automated, real-time security intelligence to swiftly and precisely discover and prioritize threats. The platform will issue alerts with actionable, rich context into developing threats. Security teams and analysts can then rapidly respond to minimize the attackers' strike. The solution will provide a complete view of activity in both cloud-based and on-premise environments as a large amount of data is ingested throughout the enterprise. Additionally, QRadar’s anomaly detection intelligence enables security teams to identify any user behavior changes that could be indicators of potential threats.
IBM QRadar Log Manager
To better help organizations protect themselves against potential security threats, attacks, and breaches, IBM QRadar Log Manager gathers, analyzes, preserves, and reports on security log events using QRadar Sense Analytics. All operating systems and applications, servers, devices, and applications are converted into searchable and actionable intelligent data. QRadar Log Manager then helps organizations meet compliance reporting and monitoring requirements, which can be further upgraded to QRadar SIEM for a more superior level of threat protection.
Some of QRadar Log Manager’s key features include:
Reviews from Real Users
IBM Security QRadar is a solution of choice among users because it provides a complete solution for security teams by integrating network analysis, log management, user behavior analytics, threat intelligence, and AI-powered investigations into a single solution. Users particularly like having a single window into their network and its ability to be used for larger enterprises.
Simon T., a cyber security services operations manager at an aerospace/defense firm, notes, "The most valuable thing about QRadar is that you have a single window into your network, SIEM, network flows, and risk management of your assets. If you use Splunk, for instance, then you still need a full packet capture solution, whereas the full packet capture solution is integrated within QRadar. Its application ecosystem makes it very powerful in terms of doing analysis."
A management executive at a security firm says, "What we like about QRadar and the models that IBM has, is it can go from a small-to-medium enterprise to a larger organization, and it gives you the same value."
Microsoft Defender XDR is a comprehensive security solution designed to protect against threats in the Microsoft 365 environment.
It offers robust security measures, comprehensive threat detection capabilities, and an efficient incident response system. With seamless integration with other Microsoft products and a user-friendly interface, it simplifies security management tasks.
Users have found it effective in detecting and preventing various types of attacks, such as phishing attempts, malware infections, and data breaches.
Watch the Microsoft demo video here: Microsoft Defender XDR demo video.
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