Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Reviews

We are a property investment company, and people here use Microsoft Surface devices for their daily job. We are a Microsoft-oriented company, and we use it for our basic endpoint security implementation. 

Our entire security is based on this endpoint solution. Sometimes you have centralized security where you scan all traffic going through a central firewall and you also check through several types of solutions. You also check HTTPS connections. Basically, for all the traffic going inside and outside the company, you use a security firewall, and this endpoint solution is actually a firewall solution or security solution that is distributed. So, all the traffic coming from and going into the end-user device is basically submitted for scanning. If you download an ISO on a website or an email, everything is scanned for security to check whether it contains any malicious data. 

We are using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Plan 2, which is the enterprise version of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. We are using the most recent version of it.

We deploy it via Intune. The feature is called Microsoft Intune Autopilot. We have a hardware hash. A colleague of mine prepares the configuration and then based on the hardware hash and Autopilot, the devices are completely installed and joined to Azure AD and then to our enterprise. Intune is a Microsoft device management platform that comes with Microsoft solutions. When you buy a new device, based on the hardware hash, it can automatically find that device through Autopilot and do the specific deployment for your company. So, the users can use any type of device, start it, and then it will automatically be joined to our environment.

It is a completely integrated platform with advanced threat analysis, SIEM features, updated inventory, and so on. It is an all-in-one solution. Microsoft is taking over lots of companies to provide more and better services to its clients. This is one of the best solutions around at the moment.

It protects our organization from all kinds of attacks, such as ransomware attacks and any malware downloads. It is like an oracle who knows everything about:

• What is around at the moment?
• From where the attacks are coming?
• What is currently going on security-wise?

It knows about all the software that you have installed on the laptop, and whether they are not patched or have security issues. It covers everything you want from your security platform.

It is a very advanced system based on AI. It has a very large database of places or sites on the internet where you should not go. It is continuously online. 

It is completely self-sufficient. You don't have to install anything. It is completely integrated into the operating system, and it also has a centralized information dashboard where you can immediately see:

• Are all your devices up to date?
• Are there any threats?
• Are the devices having problems with updates?
• Are they infected with anything?
• Was something blocked?

You can immediately see what is going on in your enterprise, in different networks, and also in people's homes in terms of endpoint security.

It is a zero-trust platform, and it integrates with all types of enterprise services that we run. It also integrates with the Office 365 environment where you can securely connect from anywhere.

It makes your Surface devices hot. It is resource-intensive. It strains your CPU, not more than other file scanners around, but it also does a lot more. When you are transmitting files or data, it is continuously scanning the traffic and analyzing it bit by bit to see what's going on, and that, of course, is costly in terms of CPU. It is CPU intensive, and if you are on battery, it drains your battery fast. That's the only drawback that it has.

They're continuously improving it. You can compare it with Teams. About a year ago, the codex and the presentation of the Teams application were not very well optimized, and if you were using the Teams application, it used to drain your battery. It still drains your battery, but they have improved it a lot, and it is a lot less CPU intensive after one year. They're working on Defender for Endpoint to make it less CPU intensive.

We have been using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint for more than six months.

Its stability is quite good, especially with Windows 11, which is a very stable operating system. Of course, you can run into some issues. We have some issues with docking stations for Surface and screens, but generally, the operating system together with the endpoint security solution is very stable.

It is the most scalable solution around. You can create an Azure tenant, and with a script, you can deploy 1,000 user accounts. There is no actual limit to it, so the scalability is infinite.

Their support has improved. They're quite good. I would rate them an eight out of ten.

Positive

It has the easiest setup that I've ever seen. It's completely integrated with Microsoft. When you deploy your machine through Autopilot and Intune and assign the license, everything is done automatically. Of course, you have a lot of possibilities and a lot of freedom for detailed configuration, but out of the box, it comes completely self-sustained. You don't have to do anything. This is one of the easiest solutions that I've seen.

You just apply for the plan in Office 365, and you set up your very basic Autopilot template where you would specify the types of software that have to be installed. For instance, you want Office or other types of software. The very basic template is enough to roll it out fully automatically.

It takes a couple of hours. If you apply for a tenant on Azure, you pay for the licenses, and you can roll out with a click on 200 to 1,000 endpoint devices within the hour. This cloud is really amazing.

We are a small company with a few technical engineers, and we provide services for our clients. We provide all kinds of services such as maintaining endpoints and Azure cloud solutions with virtualized services and SaaS services.

Its implementation is more or less handled by my colleague. I do a little bit of configuration but not so much. My colleague knows about all the technical details. He does the complete installation and the complete central management of policies and templates. However, a basic part with basic software is very quickly implemented. You just create a tenant on microsoft.com, and then you can very easily roll out to as many workstations as you would like the necessary configuration for Defender for Endpoint.

Its price at the moment is very good because you get a lot of value for your money, especially with the subscriptions. If you have the E1, E3, or E5 enterprise subscription, you pay per month per user, and you get almost an infinite number of solutions. If you compare the price to the number of solutions that you get, it is a very good deal. 

I'm only concerned about the future because Microsoft is taking over one company after another. In the end, there will be no alternative and then they can do whatever they like, but for now, in terms of price, Microsoft is one of the best performers.

At the moment, it is one of the best security platforms for endpoint security in the market. It is comparable to SentinelOne in terms of features and functions.

It is part of Microsoft's ecosystem. If you need a reliable and secure work environment, and you are bound by GDPR and other standards where you have to take care of your data and prevent breaches and unauthorized access, it is a great solution. 

The E1, E3, or E5 license contains Defender for Endpoint along with many other solutions. Having just the scanner is not enough these days. You need an overview of your whole environment. You need to make sure that your endpoints are encrypted, they are up to date, and they are correctly using zero-trust relationships for your central services. All these things that you need these days are perfectly implemented in the solutions that Microsoft provides. This is the only way for a company that takes data seriously and has to give a guarantee to customers that data is protected.

It is resource-intensive, but you have to take into account that it is not only a file scanner. It is continuously scanning every connection you make on the internet. It is deeply investigating the data that you transport and the connections that you make. It is scanning your files, and it is scanning your software against all kinds of knowledge bases to identify whether there are vulnerabilities in the software that you use. It is a solution that integrates almost everything. It is doing what a central firewall did before, but it is doing that in a distributed way on your device. So, it does so much more than you expect. If you are providing it to your users, you have to take its CPU consumption into account, and you need to provide sufficient CPU power for this.

I would rate it an eight out of ten.

It's used to improve the security score for the whole system, even if it is the cloud or on-premises version.

The security is very useful.

Its stability is okay.

The solution can scale. 

Technical support has been great.

There's no setup process; a user simply needs to enable it to get started.

We'd like the stability to be better.

I've been using the solution for about two years. 

The solution is stable. There are no bugs or glitches and it doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable and the performance is good.

The product can scale if a company needs it to.

There's a big number of users on the solution in our company. It's likely more than 400 users. 

We've dealt with support in the past and found them to be very helpful. We're quite satisfied with the level of service. 

I'm also familiar with Trend Micro, which is similar. However, Defender is specific to Microsoft.

The company does use more than one solution as well. 

There's not really an installation process. A user simply needs to enable it. That's all.

We pay a yearly licensing fee.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint can be used for system protection. For example, anti-virus, malware, and EDR.

The most valuable feature of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is that it is embedded into the Windows system. Additionally, the performance is good and simple to maintain.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is secure but when it comes to security all solutions could improve security.

I have been using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint for a couple of years.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint has been stable in our usage.

We have more than 5,000 users using this solution.

We are quite satisfied with the support.

We use many solutions in our company, such as Panda, Trend Micro, McAfee, Microsoft, and FireEye.

There is no installation required.

We have a five-person technical team that supports this solution.

The solutions price could be cheaper.

I recommend this solution to others.

I rate Microsoft Defender for Endpoint an eight out of ten.

We use Microsoft Defender for Endpoint to secure our workstations, laptops, and servers. It helps us to do virus scanning and malware protection. 

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is free and part of the licensing stack of other Microsoft products. 

The product should reduce updates since it is hard to keep up. 

I have been using the product for three to four years. 

The tool's deployment was simple. It took about a month to complete since we have over 5000 servers across various platforms. 

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint helps us save time since we don't have to keep a separate semantic console. 

We can see the threats as soon as they come in. Our security team gets notifications. 

I rate it an eight out of ten. 

We used it as an EPP and EDR solution. 

Microsoft Defender made the work quite easy because we didn't have to rely on multiple tools, and we could look at one thing. It had a specific endpoint-level reporting standard as well where you can see the vulnerable threats and the outdated versions. It was very convenient.

We had certain compliance and usage issues. For example, our company wanted to go with CIS, but we didn't have a proper way of measuring whether the endpoints have the right standards in place or whether they were compliant with CIS. Microsoft Defender was like a one-stop for most things because it gave us the vulnerability and patching scores so that our vulnerability management teams can focus on covering up the vulnerabilities and the patching team can check the vulnerable versions and deploy the right versions. It had multiple advantages for us in terms of patching, vulnerability management, adhering to security standards, and EDR and AV capabilities. 

Microsoft Defender was pretty interesting in terms of visibility. When we compare the solution that we had before with Microsoft Defender, there is almost a night and day difference. Microsoft Defender is pretty advanced with the threats. We used to run, simulate, and see whether we were prone to the latest vulnerabilities. It was a pretty good solution in our experience.

It definitely saved us a lot of time. I don't have the metrics, but because it was a one-stop place, we didn't have to navigate through all the controls and go from one place to another to look for different reports for each section. We had one tool that could do everything in one place. It would have definitely saved us nearly one-fifth or 20% of the time. It would have also saved money because you rely on one single tool for multiple things. When you go with the premium suite, you get other tools as well. There is definitely a cost-saving aspect.

It came in a suite. There were multiple other products that were included with it as well in the premium suite. Another factor was that you don't have to invest in two products, and you can get both components, the EPP and the EDR, in one. You can also do simple vulnerability management, CIS hardening, and things like that from Microsoft Defender. Those were the main reasons for considering it back then.

I haven't used the product in nearly eight months. I use it on my device, but I haven't used it at an administrative level. Previously, with Microsoft Defender, we used to have certain problems with the Mac machines, but later on, they came up with various ways so that we could use the MDM solution to do the job. They provided pretty good support. Their engineers came and tried to figure out the solution.

I'm not too sure of its current capabilities, but I'm pretty sure they are doing a good job on Windows and Mac. However, I'm not sure whether they covered Linux. If I remember correctly, Microsoft Defender didn't have anything proper on Linux back then, but if they have improved it from that aspect, it would already be ticking all the boxes.

I have used Microsoft Defender for eight months to one year in my previous organization.

In comparison to the other solutions that I've had experience with, Microsoft Defender was very good.

It was definitely scalable. In my previous organization, we enrolled more than 20,000 endpoints.

It was pretty good. At that time, Microsoft Defender was very new. When they released it for Mac, that's when we got hold of them. There was a time when their support engineers learned certain things from me about it, and I also did learn something from them. It was a win-win situation for both of us.

I would rate their support a seven out of them. The level of support depends on the complexity of the issue. If an issue is small, anyone can solve it, and it wouldn't take much time, but when you run into a complex problem, you need proper people coming in quickly and giving you some support after looking into the issue. Ideally, if they are very well-trained at all levels, that would be good.

Neutral

We had other products for antivirus and EDR. We removed those two products and replaced them with Microsoft Defender. They both were pretty good solutions in the market back then. One of them is a pretty good solution even now.

We found Microsoft Defender pretty good when we did the PoC as compared to the rest of the tools. Some of the solutions were only antivirus, and some of them were only EDR, whereas this particular tool had a lot of features built into it. So, one agent could do many things. Another reason for going for this solution was that the company I used to work with was a bit biased toward Microsoft. They were a Microsoft customer, and they were comfortable with Microsoft. 

The reliability of support was one of the reasons why we chose Microsoft. When it comes to tools, there are always requirements related to budget, level of support, and other things. When you go for a PoC and look at the demo, you might think a product is stable, but when you run into a problem, the support could be weak. In such instances, what's the use of the product if you don't have good support or if they take at least two to three days to solve a small issue?

I handled the Mac machine part of it. Initially, setting up policies and getting all the configuration profiles in place was a bit of a challenge because they didn't have proper documentation at first. During the PoC, there were not many documents or support articles, but when we were in the deployment phase, they had everything, even specific to particular MDMs, which made it very smooth. We ran into a couple of small problems, but that's pretty common in every deployment. Other than that, it was pretty smooth. 

From Microsoft's side, there is a pretty good deployment strategy in place, but different companies have different objectives and different ways of working. There are situations where certain users and groups might need something specific but other users or groups don't. There could be multiple groups of users with different expectations. So, it is pretty straightforward, but like with any security tool, there could be internal user-level challenges. However, for a company that does not have a very complex environment, it should be a piece of cake. It should be pretty easy.

In terms of our implementation strategy, we first targeted the least impacted devices because we didn't want high-end or critical users complaining about having issues. So, we selected the low-priority users and implemented it for them, and then we tested it out. After that, we implemented it for users with higher priorities. We gradually moved based on the severity.

In terms of maintenance, agent updates are required, which we scheduled automatically. It didn't seem to need much attention. If the product is in a non-complex environment, it won't have many issues, but in a complex environment, there will be some because of VLAN restrictions, network connectivity limitations, etc. We also had issues where agents were not communicating, but it was not because of an issue with the tool. It was mainly because of the complexity of the environment in terms of networking and architecture.

Microsoft Defender decreased our time to detect and time to respond. However, we didn't completely rely on one solution. We had other means as well. We used to have another EDR solution as well, and we used to run both together.

I would definitely agree with a security colleague who says that it’s better to go with a best-of-breed strategy rather than a single vendor’s security suite. For example, if you are a one-vendor customer, the day the vendor gets hit with zero-day or any huge attack, none of your tools or software would work. Your data and other things are also at risk. So, having multiple vendors is good because you'll be covered by different products. 

Microsoft Defender's threat intelligence helps to prepare for potential threats before they hit and take practice steps, but there was another team that was using the threat intelligence and reporting capabilities to see whether the organization was ready. In my previous organization, we had overall IT support, which was then divided into nearly 20 different teams. We had one team specifically to do one specific job. 

For prioritization of threats, if I'm not wrong, Microsoft Defender gives you a severity value. I haven't been in the admin part for long, but it gives you a severity value. Based on that, you can prioritize your threats.

I would rate Microsoft Defender an eight out of ten. 

We have a dedicated team that handles all security-related aspects of the solution, however, my understanding is that the solution helps guard the endpoints in our organization. 

Along with security, there are certain IT policies in terms of accessibility of different sites, which are there in the organization. With everything put together, there haven't been any instances where I have seen any kind of issues such as malware or other malicious event getting through on my laptop. From that perspective, everything is fine. 

The patch updates and version updates are very good. Those happen on an automated basis whenever I'm connecting to the organization network, either through LAN or through the VPN. I never have to worry about anything being out-of-date.

The solution scales well.

I have found the stability to be good.

From a general user perspective, I don't see any further improvements needed. 

The price, in general, could always be a little bit cheaper.

I've used the solution for two years or so. It's not much more than that.

The stability of the product is good. I have not dealt with bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. the performance is good. It's reliable. 

The solution scales well. If a company needs to expand it, it can.

We have 1,000 to 2,000 people on the solution currently.

I've never directly dealt with technical support for issues related to Defender. Many years ago I had reached out to Microsoft support for an issue related to Visio, a different product.

The initial setup is straightforward. There are certain automatic patches as well that keep on updating and those automatically install.

I don't recall how long the product took to deploy. When any new laptop or anything is assigned in an organization, all these things are installed prior to coming to us. Therefore, I wasn't actually a part of the installation process. 

We have a few contractors working with the in-house team. There may be around five to ten people. Any maintenance that is needed would be done by them.

The pricing could be lower. That said, I cannot speak to the exact costs involved as I do not directly deal with that aspect of the product. I'm unsure if the company is set up with a monthly or yearly subscription package. 

I'm just a customer and an end-user.

I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten. I've been very pleased with how it has worked for me over the last two years. 

I would recommend the solution to others, however, I'm just a passive end-users and not as technically involved as those deploying the solution in our company. However, from my perspective, there has never been an issue on my machine with malware and therefore it seems to be doing what it's designed to do.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint can be used for protecting personal information and file in my organization.

The solution has saved us time by not having to install separate third-party antivirus solutions.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is beneficial because we are using Microsoft Windows and all the core solutions are made by Microsoft, such as the authentic platform, operating system, and antivirus protection. It is a heterogeneous environment. We had to use third-party solutions before and update everything separately. For example, the policy for antivirus. With Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, when Microsoft Windows receives updates it will update with it. This is one main advantage of this solution.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint can improve by making the reporting faster. It takes some time to reflect back to the administration portal of what has been updated. For example, out of 100 Computers, approximately 90 computers received updates, but when you check the administration portal over one or two days, you will only see 75, even though 90 were updated.

I have been using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint for approximately one year.

The solution is stable.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint has been scalable.

We have more than 200 users using this solution in my organization.

Previously we used McAfee and Symantec Endpoint. Every five years we change the solution. However, this time we changed to Microsoft Defender for Endpoint because we wanted a unified platform.

When you install Microsoft Windows 10, Microsoft Defender for Endpoint comes with it. There is no installation of the solution other than installing Windows 10. It saves time because you do not have to use any new kind of policy or deployment.

We have a team of three that do the management of the solution.

The solution comes free with Microsoft Windows 10.

I rate Microsoft Defender for Endpoint a ten out of ten.

We primarily used the solution as Endpoint Detection and protection (EDR, EPP) with secondary benefits of threats and vulnerability management, security incident response, automated query and real-time device monitoring, and with the capability of email security, identity management (DFI), and task automation (Power automate). We used respective licenses where required.

The solution was also used for an endpoint antivirus for workstations in a multi-OS environment, including Windows and Mac OS. We had file, device, and user trajectory monitoring for the security operations team.

The solution benefited the company via:

• OS-level/Tool compatibility for endpoints running Windows (since both are Microsoft products and Defender core files are included in Win10 or later delivery).
• Heuristic capability. Consistent usage of MDE indicates that the tools are continuously learning new prevention techniques by pulling real-time up-to-date cloud resources.

• Alert chaining. The solution makes security Incidents, events, and alerts less tedious from a Security Operation Center standpoint. This can result in false negatives or detriment for small to medium-scale firms running no or semi-automated threat response features.

The most valuable aspects of the solution include:

• Advanced hunting. The product offers flexibility, visibility, and automation capability using a user-friendly query language (KQL).
• Reporting. Clear and concisely plotted graphics show real-time data representation - which is valuable to upper management.

• Scalability/API. We are able to productively integrate with existing on-prem, hybrid, or cloud applications. 
• Great OOB features. The solution comes with SIEM-ingestion-ready features for extensive visibility, automation, and integration, including advanced hunting, threats and vulnerability management, embedded simulation for end-to-end testing, ransomware prevention (Controlled Folder Access), and Attack Surface Reduction (ASR) rules.

Improvements could be made via:

• Clicks. There's a poor user experience with lots of optimizable opportunities of user interface particularly on the newly improved portal (https://security.microsoft.com/). Features like device inventory continue to lack essential workstation drill-downs showing the entire device information with the least effort.

• De-centralized console features. Discrepancies with enabling core features at the click of a button within the MDE portal is mostly due to prerequisites that are tied to the functionality or partial enforcement requirements from other Microsoft tools (Group policy, Azure, Sentinel, SCCM, Intune). EDR in block mode requires Intune security baselines and tamper protection requires MAPS enabled. Web content filtering also has security baseline dependencies

• No single pane of glass. There are too many loose ends with tiny bits and pieces to enforce essential security policies compared to other EDR solutions within the same caliber. A typical example is having to create exclusions in different locations for entirely different functionalities, such as: automation folder exclusion, group policy exclusions (per tenant), Controlled Folder Access (ASR) Allowed application, and Attack Surface Reduction (ASR).

• Service Requests. Noncritical cases with MDE technical support teams tend to be queued for over a week before the first customer engagement. Most of these tickets also end up in the hands of temporary or contracted non-Microsoft employees who are scripted and offer little attention to unique incidents.

Suggested additional features that should be included in the next release include:

• Digestible interface/filter for crown-jewel capabilities like ASR, CFA and Exploit mitigation occurrences.
• Restoration of an always visible search bar from the previous console view (https://securitycenter.windows.com).
• A definitive action plan for Secure Score recommendations and deduplicate of controls.

We were using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint prior to its change of name from Defender ATP. We experienced a plethora of GA changes including, but not limited to, IOS/multiple OS support, device discovery, web content filtering, API updates, and continuous integrations with existing security tools.