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Microsoft Defender for Identity vs Veritas Alta SaaS Protection comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 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

Microsoft Defender for Iden...
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
8th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
28
Ranking in other categories
Microsoft Security Suite (6th), Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) (1st)
Veritas Alta SaaS Protection
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
31st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
SaaS Backup (25th), SaaS Management Platforms (13th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Identity is 3.4%, down from 4.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Veritas Alta SaaS Protection is 1.8%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Defender for Identity3.4%
Veritas Alta SaaS Protection1.8%
Other94.8%
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
 

Featured Reviews

CM
Technology Coordinator at a educational organization with 501-1,000 employees
Helps detect threats faster and prioritize critical security tasks with increased visibility
The feature I value most about Microsoft Defender for Identity is the ability to see where people are attempting to log in from. Microsoft Defender for Identity helps me automate routine tasks and find alerts that I set up to receive, so it helps me get where I'm trying to go easier and faster. I can see where everything is at. Microsoft Defender for Identity helps me prioritize important tasks. If I get an alert for a user who downloaded an application that is not sanctioned, I normally go straight to that user's computer device to find the device name and the user. Now I can get to them much faster. Microsoft Defender for Identity saves me time overall. I can quantify the time saved by Microsoft Defender for Identity as maybe 25 minutes, or if expressed as a percentage, maybe 20 to 25%. Some of the learning curve and actually learning what these products do takes time to figure out. Microsoft Defender for Identity definitely helps decrease the time of detection and response.
SG
Technical Manager at Rigor Systems Limited
Experience with offsite backup enhances data integrity and reduces on-premise reliance
One of the features of Veritas Alta SaaS Protection that customers are looking for is immutability. This is the most important feature. With the cloud, Veritas Alta SaaS Protection is actually in the cloud, which means they have unlimited space to do their backups. They can expand on a need-to-need basis. The automated recovery feature of Veritas Alta SaaS Protection makes the recovery much easier, as opposed to earlier methods where we were using scripts to do the restore. Currently, it's automated so you just do a click. You select the feature in a graphical interface, making it easy to use even for a newbie.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It automates routine testing and helps automate the finding of high-value alerts."
"The most valuable feature is its hybrid artificial intelligence, which gathers forensic data to track and counteract security threats, much like the CSI series in effect."
"The basic security monitoring at its core feature is the most valuable aspect. But also the investigative parts, the historical logging of events over the network are extremely interesting because it gives an in-depth insight into the history of account activity that is really easy to read, easy to follow, and easy to export."
"It gives companies a lot of insights that they didn't have before and has increased the security posture significantly."
"I would rate Microsoft Defender for Identity at nine out of ten."
"One of our users had the same password for every personal and company account. That was a problem because she started receiving phishing emails that could compromise all of her accounts. Defender told us that the user was not changing their password."
"The best feature is security monitoring, which detects and investigates suspicious user activities. It can easily detect advanced attacks based on the behavior. The credentials are securely stored, so it reduces the risk of compromise. It will monitor user behavior based on artificial intelligence to protect the identities in your organization. It will even help secure the on-premise Active Directory. It syncs from the cloud to on-premise, and on-premise modifications will be reflected in the cloud."
"Defender for Identity has not affected the end-user experience."
"The most valuable features are the ease of administration and the ease of configuration."
"I would recommend this solution because it covers the total scope of Office 365."
"It's a good solution. It's pretty stable."
"What I like most about Veritas SaaS Backup is that it is easy to work on and has compatible features."
"The solution's hardware appliance is very scalable and very useful."
"Veritas is loaded with features because the appliance is ready to integrate with the cloud in cases where the customers have a hybrid or cloud environment."
"he most valuable feature is that it's not so intrusive with computer resources."
"The automated recovery feature of Veritas Alta SaaS Protection makes the recovery much easier, as opposed to earlier methods where we were using scripts to do the restore."
 

Cons

"Microsoft should look at what competing vendors like CrowdStrike and Broadcom are doing and incorporate those features into Sentinel and Defender. At the same time, I think the intelligence inside the product is improving fast. They should incorporate more zero-trust and hybrid trust approaches. They need to build up threat intelligence based on threats and methods used in attacks on other companies."
"The configuration process is time-consuming, with installation taking two minutes but prerequisites requiring two hours."
"The tracking instance needs to be configured appropriately."
"I would like to be able to do remediation from the platform because it is just a scanner right now. If you onboard a device, it shows you what is happening, but you can't use it to fix things. You need to go into the system to fix it instead."
"Microsoft Defender for Identity does not save me time, but I think it is the way that I secure the data."
"The solution could be better at using group-managed access and they could replace it with broad-based access controls."
"Feedback on sync issues with the Microsoft portal highlighted its slow nature, with syncs sometimes taking eight hours."
"They should improve the automation for impossible travel detection. When connected to Wi-Fi and then to VPN, the system sometimes interprets the IP address change as impossible travel."
"Currently, it isn't possible to use anything other than Veritas cloud to back up to. I think today it's important to cover the three major cloud provider: GCP, Azure and AWS."
"The usability of the solution isn't the best."
"Licensing has been a struggle."
"The go-between is a Veritas partner, so the customer support was not that good."
"The backup reports and the dashboard need improvement."
"They should review the cost aspect of the subscription for Veritas Alta SaaS Protection because customers are going for the cheaper storage, which doesn't give those features in terms of dedup ratios."
"Licensing has been a struggle. It went from bronze, silver to gold. Licensing needs more sophistication. It has features that are sold as separate add-ons."
"Other people will prefer this solution because they're used to it. However, from my point of view, you have more breaks, more failures on it than you will with Commvault."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"You won't be able to change your tenants from where you deploy them. For example, if you select Canada, they will charge you based on Canadian pricing. If you are also in London, when you deploy in Canada, the pound is higher than Canadian dollars, but your platform resources are billable in Canadian dollars. Using your pounds to pay for any of these things will be cheaper. Or, if you deploy in London, they will charge you based on your local currency."
"Defender for Identity is a little more expensive than other Microsoft products. Identity and Microsoft Defender for Cloud are both a bit costly."
"Microsoft Defender for Identity comes as part of the Microsoft E5 licensing stack."
"The product is costly, and we had multiple discussions with accounting to receive a discounted rate. However, on the open market, the tool is expensive."
"It is very affordable considering that other SIEM solutions are much more expensive and have many more licensing restrictions and fees."
"The program is quite expensive."
"The tool is expensive compared to Veeam."
"This solution is not cheap and not expensive but priced in the mid-range."
"I would rate this solution's pricing as five out of five."
"SaaS Backup isn't the most expensive solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Construction Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise15
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Identity?
I really would have to sit down to think about how Microsoft Defender for Identity can be improved. I didn't take stock in what needs to be improved because I appreciated having the tools right the...
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Defender for Identity?
My main use cases for Microsoft Defender for Identity include Conditional Access, checking risky users, remediating risky users, and user sign-ins. I can easily remediate or determine what the user...
What advice do you have for others considering Microsoft Defender for Identity?
I don't really use Microsoft Defender for Identity a lot because my new role doesn't allow me to take time to do so. I don't really use the threat intelligence feature of Microsoft Defender for Ide...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Veritas Alto SaaS Protection?
Veritas Alta SaaS Protection is slightly expensive, but they can do more on it. The exact figure for Veritas Alta SaaS Protection depends on the size of data being stored, the region, and the type ...
What needs improvement with Veritas Alto SaaS Protection?
For Veritas Alta SaaS Protection, the only challenge is downtime and the impact of time synchronization whereby different customers are on different time zones, and Veritas Alta SaaS Protection is ...
What is your primary use case for Veritas Alto SaaS Protection?
For the customers that I'm dealing with, they are using Veritas Alta SaaS Protection for long-term retention and offline backups. This means they don't have to constrain their on-premise resources....
 

Also Known As

Azure Advanced Threat Protection, Azure ATP, MS Defender for Identity
SaaS Backup
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Identity is trusted by companies such as St. Luke’s University Health Network, Ansell, and more.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Identity vs. Veritas Alta SaaS Protection and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
921,148 professionals have used our research since 2012.