Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Reviews

We use Microsoft Defender for Endpoint as our EDR solution on all of our user endpoints.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint provides comprehensive visibility into endpoint security. I've been impressed with its ability to detect and monitor threats without any noticeable gaps in coverage.

We use the entire suite of Microsoft products, which are all integrated. Integrating them is very easy. However, getting them to function as expected after integration was a little more difficult.

The integrated solutions work together to deliver detection and response. However, their behavior may not always align with our expectations.

The implementation of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint has enhanced our organization's security posture by augmenting our visibility, particularly through the integration of MDE, Sentinel, and Defender for Cloud Apps. Additionally, Intune, when utilized in conjunction with these products, provides comprehensive insights into identity and device risks. The deployment began about three years ago before I joined the company. In terms of EDR or just basic visibility, that was achieved within the first year or so. However, we are still working towards a holistic vision of visibility, especially with Defender for Cloud Apps.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint consolidates multiple dashboards, as all of our security products are Microsoft-based, simplifying our security management.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint has saved us time compared to our previous solution, which was an on-premises Trellix EDR solution. This is especially evident in the areas of maintenance and operations.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint's WCS function, a content filtering solution, has proven to be the most useful, stable, and reliable option for our current needs.

Defender for Cloud Apps is one of the most significant products that Microsoft could improve. We've encountered several limitations with Defender for Cloud Apps, such as the inability to create custom cloud applications and add URLs. These features would be valuable for the scoping feature in Defender for Cloud Apps, as each application can currently only have one scope. It cannot have multiple scopes, meaning that an application cannot be blocked for some device groups and allowed for others. This is another limitation we've encountered frequently.

The technical support is slow to respond.

The product development team makes frequent changes that affect the stability of the solution.

I am currently using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. 

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is generally stable, but the frequent product changes made by the development team have caused several instances of unusability this year. These changes often introduce bugs that disrupt web functionality, bringing it to a standstill. While the product itself is stable when not affected by these bugs, the recurring issue has occurred three or four times in the past year.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is as scalable as any other cloud-based EDR solution. I would give the scalability a nine out of ten.

The technical support is slow to respond and very log-focused.

The deployment process is straightforward. We can utilize a script for Intune that can be deployed through SCCM.

The base price for an E5 license, which includes Enterprise Mobility + Security E5, is $57 per user per month. However, there are additional costs for certain security features, such as Premium Threat and Vulnerability Management and Insider Risk Management.

I would rate Microsoft Defender for Endpoint six out of ten. The support and product development team need to improve.

We have deployed Microsoft Defender for Endpoint across the globe on all of our endpoints.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint updates itself so there is no need for maintenance.

It is advisable to always exercise patience with technical support and occasionally guide them in the right direction. Otherwise, they may become overly focused on irrelevant logs. Additionally, it is crucial to always have a contingency plan in place in case Microsoft Defender for Endpoint encounters unforeseen challenges.

The effectiveness of both best-of-breed and single-vendor security suite methodologies hinges on seamless integration. When products integrate effectively, they provide a unified view of the security landscape, enabling comprehensive monitoring and threat detection. A SIEM, XDR, or similar tool can serve as this centralized dashboard, providing a single pane of glass for security operations. By centralizing visibility and streamlining response times, organizations can effectively achieve their information security analysis and response objectives.

We use Microsoft Defender for Endpoint for our antivirus protection.

The visibility into threats that Defender for Endpoint provides is good because we are using all Microsoft products. 

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint assists us in prioritizing threats throughout our enterprise. This prioritization of threats is crucial for safeguarding end-user devices.

Sentinel allows us to gather data from our entire ecosystem, and the interface is highly impressive. Data ingestion is of utmost importance for our organization, especially concerning the security of our environment.

It allows us to comprehensively investigate threats and respond from a unified platform. This is of great significance to us, as Sentinel plays a pivotal role in our Security Operations Center.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint assists us in automating the prioritization of critical alerts. I am certified in cybersecurity. Recently, I have begun the process of renewing my certification as it is set to expire next year. I have been reading numerous articles regarding Sentinel, Defender for Cloud, Identity, and Endpoint applications, and there is a multitude of information available. Automation is now fully integrated, which holds significant importance for enterprise-level customers.

The solution assists in eliminating the necessity of using multiple dashboards, providing us with a single XDR dashboard integrated across various Microsoft products.

The threat intelligence assists us in preparing for potential threats before they occur, allowing us to take proactive measures to prevent them. The assessment mechanism analyzes and identifies threats, providing clear instructions before we proceed to the security parameters.

It has saved our clients time, mainly with their SOC operations. 

The antivirus is the most valuable feature.

There are alternative solutions that offer a greater range of dashboard insights when compared to Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. The solution needs better integration with third-party vendors.

The analysis that identifies the threats and remedies them can be enhanced in a future release.

I have been using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint for almost four years.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is stable.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is scalable.

The quality of technical support is determined by the customer's priority levels: P1, P2, and P3. Overall, they are known to provide good support.

Sometimes, the support takes a while to respond, and their shifts change, so we have to begin again with the new person on the shift.

Positive

The initial setup is straightforward for me. All Microsoft products are easy to configure and integrate data also. To properly utilize all the features the person integrating must understand the architecture code concept as well.

Before deployment, I consistently conduct a rapid assessment to comprehend the customer's infrastructure. Subsequently, I formulate a plan grounded in this information. Typically, we aim for minimal personnel involvement due to the centralized nature of cloud operations. Additionally, we can advocate for either GPO or CCM deployment software. Our approach entails utilizing a singular architect, one resource, and one SME for implementing and overseeing the infrastructure, aligning with the security prerequisites of the customer's locale. Continuous monitoring of the infrastructure is imperative, maintaining a 24/7 vigilance.

The implementation takes around three months to install and configure.

The pricing is competitive. The pay model is pay as we use.

For organizations that make use of all Microsoft solutions, the cost is lower, and the visibility is increased.

I rate Microsoft Defender for Endpoint nine out of ten.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is indeed a commendable product. However, despite its implementation, we should consider the integration of other security products. This is due to the escalating variety of cyberattacks prevalent today. While Windows consistently issues patches to update its existing products, I propose the adoption of a dual-product approach within our infrastructure. This approach aims to preempt eleventh-hour security breaches. By juxtaposing and scrutinizing the attributes of different solutions, we can better comprehend their nuances, specifically at the feature level. The pivotal factor lies in how adeptly a solution identifies and mitigates potential threats. Therefore, I advocate for the incorporation of two distinct solutions within our infrastructure. This strategy is poised to yield heightened efficiency, effectively mitigating the risks of both security breaches and data breaches.

We use Microsoft Defender for Endpoint as an enterprise security solution.

The visibility is great. For example, Microsoft Defender for Endpoint's portal has a section called threat analytics. There's a threat intelligence box. So all new threats and trending threats are visible. If any of our devices in our organization are susceptible to this threat, the solution will let us know because it searches for that specific particular vulnerability, which can be exploited. The Microsoft threat analytics tool gives us that type of visibility into the threats that might affect our organization. For example, the threat analysis updates every half hour to one hour with the top ten latest threats. The scan tries to ensure that these threats don't belong to our organization and if they do, it identifies the infected device. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint makes a lot of security recommendations when we onboard it to quarantine a lot of security recommendations that help to improve the security posture of our environment.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint assists our organization in prioritizing threats across our enterprise by providing security recommendations based on the weaknesses in our organization. It includes a department that provides management licenses and uses analytics to identify high-priority threats in our environment. This is connected to a common protocol that assigns a priority level of five to devices with vulnerabilities, indicating what actions should be taken. Thus, we have all the necessary information in one place.

Prioritization is crucial because there is a possibility of a high-priority threat entering our environment. This is how the solution determines the priority of threats. For instance, if one of our high-impact business devices is vulnerable to a top-priority security five threat we need to address it first. Alternatively, we may choose to address the sixty computers with a level two or three security threat, which are mostly associated with lower impacts. Therefore, prioritization aids in determining which critical business infrastructure requires immediate attention.

There are several lines with multiple solutions, but Microsoft offers a comprehensive solution with its E5 license. This license includes a wide range of features such as purview information protection, data protection, and other business-related tools. In my previous experience, I have noticed that some organizations utilize multiple Microsoft products, such as Defender for Endpoint, Identity Management, Defender for Cloud Applications, and Defender for IoT. This combination of different products can be quite useful.

Microsoft Defender for Cloud on Azure can be easily integrated with Defender for Endpoint, including on-premise solutions that can be onboarded to Azure with different subscription values. The integration will already onboard it to the device with Defender for Endpoint, along with additional features such as Just-in-Time Access, Defender for Vulnerability Management, and Control Sign-in Monitoring. These features provide robust cloud security monitoring and can be added to Defender for Endpoint. Moreover, Defender for Cloud is integrated with Defender for Endpoint portals, enabling a one-stop shop for onboarding devices with all the cloud posture management required for a single computer or software. This integration is highly beneficial, and other applications can be similarly integrated.

It is easy to integrate Microsoft Defender for Endpoint with other solutions.

These solutions seamlessly integrate to create a zero-trust platform, as offered by Microsoft. This platform ensures protection from various threats such as networks, applications, and infrastructure, with the added benefit of Microsoft Sentinel. The Sentinel tool combines threat analytics from multiple sources into a user-friendly workspace, providing optimal productivity. Additionally, sending logs from any of these products, including Sentinel, to the cloud connector is a simple process.

The integrated Microsoft security products offer comprehensive threat protection, such as Microsoft Defender for Office. With these products, our office is now able to identify and address email threats in a single platform, instead of checking each platform individually for application, identity, vulnerability management, and endpoint security. Moreover, these products can be easily integrated into a single workspace solution. With the help of pre-existing methods in Sentinel, we can efficiently handle a large number of alerts that we receive. Rather than going through each alert individually, we can activate a playbook that provides solutions for common alerts and takes actions in parallel to resolving them. This integration simplifies the process of achieving a complete security solution.

When we transition from on-premise servers to Azure ARC resources and activate Defender for Cloud Applications, it becomes easier to manage our servers from different networks, especially when it comes to security features. For example, we can check the compliance of our devices and organization with PCI DSS or other security protocols. Running compliance checks during the transition while syncing data with a different SL Cloud provides us with a significant amount of data and valuable information, including recommendations for improving compliance. This process involves bi-directional communication between devices, the cloud, Azure, and different network clouds.

Microsoft Sentinel allows us to easily ingest data from our entire ecosystem.

Microsoft Sentinel allows us to investigate threats and respond holistically from a single platform. Sentinel is both a SOAR and SIEM solution, meaning we can perform responses, but we must create a separate playbook for them. The default method may include some pre-built responses. The most important aspect is that if our company uses SentinelOne instead of Defender, we can still easily send logs through our Sentinel Workspace using API calls. This can be accomplished with a few connections, and we can create our own playbooks for different types of alerts. For example, if SentinelOne is not sending data, we can generate alerts of this type and respond accordingly. This significantly reduces user effort.

The security protection offered by Sentinel is extensive. It can be integrated with any Microsoft solutions, including information protection, and can be connected directly to Microsoft's threat intelligence sources and other resources. This allows for comprehensive protection.

Our clients have reported that Sentinel's cost and ease of use, in comparison to other stand-alone SIEM and SOAR solutions, are favorable. They find the user-friendliness of Sentinel to be worth the cost.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint assists in automating routine tasks and identifying high-value alerts. We can automate actions based on the alert's sensitivity, and in case we are uncertain of how to handle those alerts, we have the option to seek assistance from a Defender expert. This feature is particularly valuable, as it can provide guidance in identifying and investigating such alerts.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint helps eliminate multiple dashboards by giving us one XDR dashboard.

The solution's threat intelligence helps us detect and respond to threats proactively by identifying suspicious behavior.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint has been instrumental in saving us time by alerting us about potential threats and automatically guiding us through the necessary steps to eliminate them. The solution logs all the actions taken, saving us from having to spend valuable time retracing the steps.

By detecting threats in advance before they can propagate, Microsoft Defender for Endpoint helps our organization save money. The tool helps to identify potential security risks early, preventing their escalation and the associated costs of mitigation.

Our detection and response time has improved. This is thanks to Microsoft Defender, which has Endpoint Detection and Response capabilities. Before, we used to manually create policies to address security incidents, but now the system can automatically remediate issues without us having to intervene.

The most valuable aspect is the information, specifically the automatic investigation of packages. For instance, during an automated investigation, data and information are collected. Additionally, there is an encapsulated view that shows the origin of the package, how it was propagated, and any blockages or attacks that may have occurred. The most critical factor is the information gathered regarding various types of incidents, including how they are mapped and propagated, and what actions should be taken in response.

Creating antivirus profiles for Linux is a more challenging task compared to other operating systems. The profiling method currently in use is not very user-friendly and has ample scope for improvement.

I have been using the solution for over four years.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is stable.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint can scale effectively to meet the needs of our environment, regardless of its size.

The technical support team is highly knowledgeable, and in cases where they are unable to provide a solution, they escalate the issue to the second level of support. Their services are available around the clock, and if the assigned representative is unavailable, they promptly transfer the ticket to another capable person to ensure a seamless resolution of the issue.

Positive

I previously utilized SentinelOne, Kaspersky Endpoint Detection and Response, Symantec Endpoint Detection and Response, and Carbon Black CB Defense. However, I find Microsoft Defender for Endpoint to be more user-friendly than the other solutions. The information provided by Defender is valuable, and the deployment process is easy. Additionally, it offers several valuable features.

The complexity of deployment depends on the client's environment. The number of people required for the deployment depends on the number of servers the organization has. For example, in a deployment of 700 workstations and 500 servers, one full-time and two part-time consultants are required.

We implement the solution for our clients in-house.

We experienced a positive return on investment by using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. This solution allows us to streamline our operations by consolidating all necessary components under a single umbrella and eliminating the need for additional vendors and extra costs.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is included with a Microsoft E5 license.

I give the solution an eight out of ten.

The most cost-effective and user-friendly option for security is a single-vendor security suite. This approach also eliminates the need for multiple integrations.

I recommend that organizations avail themselves of Microsoft's trials and demos, and compare Defender with other solutions in their environment to determine the best fit. With a Microsoft E5 license, organizations can access all of Microsoft's solutions and use whatever they need.

We use Microsoft Defender for Endpoint to protect our devices from virus and malware attacks.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint provides visibility into threats. Using the solution we can see threats easily and address them in order to protect our devices.

The solution provides an overview and we can configure it to have a higher queue, to take action against any risks.

The prioritization of threats is very important to us. With Defender, we can prevent attacks in a number of ways. When we are alerted about a potential threat, it is important to prioritize and take action quickly. We can check the type of incident and confirm the threat level.

We also use Microsoft Sentinel. The solution enables us to investigate threats and respond holistically from one place. Our success is also a result of our four-year investment. I have invested a lot of time in studying Microsoft products and technical subjects such as firewalls.

Microsoft Defender is a good tool. As an anti-virus solution, it helps monitor for any attacks. The solution works similarly to an alarm and is very important. Microsoft Defender is the best protection solution for me, it's safe to use, and I can see the alerts in real-time.

The benefits of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint are immediately clear when implementing it across the enterprise. Within a week the entire enterprise noticed the benefits. The solution communicates with all employees through all devices across the organization. For me, Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is the best.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint has saved us around two months a year of time.

The solution significantly reduced our detection and response time because it is integrated with all the devices across the enterprise. All the devices are constantly being analyzed and monitored so in the instance there is an anomaly detected we are notified and able to respond quickly.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is different from other security tools because we can configure it to use multiple types of scanning or archiving. Microsoft Defender is an important tool for our security arsenal. We can also use the solution to perform many tasks.

Integrating Microsoft Defender for Endpoint with other Microsoft solutions is easy as long as the organization has a proper implementation process. The devices and materials need to be organized and connected in a way that is efficient for the organization, and the implementation process must be considered.

Our integrated solutions work natively together with Microsoft Defender for Endpoint to deliver coordinated detection and response across our environment which is very important.

Sometimes the software doesn't work the way we expect it to, and in those cases, we can't communicate with a device because it may be infected. When this happens we can't access the device directly or implement the interface.

I have been using the solution for three years.

The solution is stable.

The solution is very scalable.

I give the solution a nine out of ten.

The comprehensiveness of Sentinel's security protection is linked to identity management and is very easy.

Our primary use case is for protecting Windows 10 endpoints. We use it for email scanning and application control, we can run analytics through it, and the product enables web content filtering. The Defender 365 package is all-encompassing now; it's a good product.

The solution is deployed across our whole business with 3,000 endpoints, including phones, laptops, tablets, and desktops, with 1,700 end users.

We use multiple Microsoft security products, including Defender, Defender for Cloud Apps, Identity Manager, and Intune. We have the whole security package.  

I was the infrastructure engineer who integrated the products, which was elementary; we rolled out via Intune and used SCCM to build the endpoints.  

The solutions work natively together to deliver coordinated detection and response across our environment, and it's better than using Symantec, for example. Defender is the best product out there; it's built into Windows, and it makes sense to use built-in products. This coordination is strategically important to us, as it makes passing knowledge on to the team easier because it's all in one place.   

The solution offers better management of endpoints when it comes to antivirus and malware. It allows us to separate the functionality of managing that security area rather than putting it with the infrastructure team. The infrastructure team handles the monitoring services. At the same time, virus and threat detection can go to the core security team, which takes a load off the infrastructure team and allows the security team to concentrate fully on security.

Defender for Endpoint helps automate routine tasks and the finding of high-value alerts. Once we set our rules, including attack surface reduction (ASR) rules, there's a lot of automation capability. We can apply definitions for all endpoints across our organization.  

The solution helped eliminate having to look at multiple dashboards and gave us one XDR dashboard, which positively affected our security operations. There are four staff in the department, so they appreciate this kind of management. They can see everything from one place, and our security picture is more integrated. They can even carry out basic auditing from the dashboard.  

Defender for Endpoint saves us time because we can quickly go in and search for issues raised by the security department and eliminate the threat. We have 3,000 assets, so it saves the network around half an hour and the infrastructure staff a couple of hours.   

The virus scanning capability is excellent, and it feeds all the logs into the Microsoft 365 Defender portal, making them easy to search for.

We can track web activity and see what users are logged into. The solution picks up a lot of information from machines and pushes it into the Defender 365 portal and Cloud App Security portal.

The product provides good visibility into threats. We can also log in anywhere, which is handy for the security teams.  

Defender for Endpoint helps us prioritize threats across our enterprise; we can configure specific rules concerning viruses, malware, and threat detection.   

In terms of the comprehensiveness of the threat protection provided by Microsoft security products, it's the best in the marketplace. The top three are Defender, Sophos, and Symantec; the others don't come close to these. 

The solution's threat intelligence helps us take proactive steps to prepare for potential threats before they hit because it tracks definitions and threat footprints from the cloud. These can then be identified and stopped at the front door, which is the whole idea of antivirus products these days.

The integration and effectiveness of email security could be better. It's already built-in to the solution and checks emails, scans the links they contain etc.

I've been using the solution since its first iteration came out in 2005, so about 17 years. 

The solution is scalable; we have it deployed across our entire organization to 3,000 endpoints, and 1,700 end users. 

The support is good; I don't have an issue with them. It's straightforward to go into Azure and raise a ticket, although you must know how to ask the right question.

Positive

As far as I know, my organization used Defender for Cloud Apps for a long time and Symantec for service. Symantec is configurable, but it isn't always quick enough to deal with threats, as it has different quarantining methods.

I installed Darktrace for a data center and prefer to work with MS security products.

I wasn't involved in the initial setup; I was a global admin.  

In terms of maintenance, the product is lightweight; any patches are downloaded automatically, and we can configure when they're installed in our patch definitions.

We have the E5 security license, and the solution comes with that.

I rate the solution ten out of ten.

We use Defender for Cloud and make use of its bi-directional sync capabilities, or use Intune, so all our computer objects are synced via Azure ID and pushed into Intune. This capability is there, and it functions, though there are more important features.

It isn't easy to say if the product saves us money and the business is not overly concerned about the cost of Endpoint. You get what you pay for, it's an integrated solution, and there isn't a better one on the market. It does the job, is configurable, and has limitations like all products.

Once Defender for Endpoint becomes more mature in a couple of years, it'll be the Holy Grail like Windows 7 was.

To a security collogue who says it's better to go with a best-of-breed strategy rather than a single vendor's security suite, I'd say Microsoft is the best of breed for those who want a unified approach or integrated solution. I wouldn't use other security products because it's not necessary. I'd integrate the Microsoft security suite anywhere I go.   

It is our endpoint protection solution as a part of the full Defender Suite that we use. We use it for every one of our devices, including Macs and Windows.

Each endpoint is with Intune, and then the management is done out of Azure.

It takes automated actions. If a device is found to have a virus, it will automatically remove it, isolate the device, and then notify us to follow up. That way, things are less critical when we get to them. It will stop the spread. We're a worldwide company with very few people on the security staff. It allows us to remove the risk in an immediate fashion without the staff having to jump on it, which just takes time.

It helps us prioritize threats across our enterprise. We have limited resources to deal with the threats. So, this prioritization is critical to us.

We use more than just Defender for Endpoint. We use Defender for Identity, Defender for Office 365, and Cloud App security. We use the whole 365 Defender suite. It is easy to integrate these products. The challenge is having all the features in your environment and obviously making it work within your environment because of your different applications and business processes, but all these solutions work natively together to deliver coordinated detection and response across our environment. This is critical for us because we have limited resources. So, allowing the machines to talk to each other and not having to jump from place to place just makes life a lot easier.

We use Microsoft Defender for Cloud for the hybrid cloud environment. We are not multi-cloud at this point. We use it to identify weaknesses within our environment, both prem and off-prem so that we can prioritize. We do not use Sentinel at this time.

For the most part, it gives me what I need in one spot. I do have to drill down into other dashboards for more defined reports. We go into the Intune dashboard for compliance and things like that.

Its threat intelligence helps prepare us for potential threats before they hit and take proactive steps. We use the secure score to help identify what we need to do to protect against things as they come up. It lets us know about any ransomware out there so we can jump right on those and do protections. We also use it for the compliance piece against NIST, PCI, and things of that nature.

It saves time. If I didn't have the integrated pieces of Microsoft Defender, to do the same amount and be on top of things, I would probably need two FTEs.

It has absolutely decreased our time to detect and time to respond.

The best thing I like about it is its interaction with the other Defender products. It provides the ability to push telemetry up. It gives me endpoint visibility and allows me to take automated actions. 

It is excellent in terms of visibility into threats. It is very comprehensive in terms of threat detection, and it keeps on getting better. They are consistently adding new features.

They're in the process of pulling more things together. They can continue with the integrations and provide a better way of seeing the impact of security changes, especially on the endpoint side. Before we actually flip the switch, we should be able to see the impact of security changes on the business or business applications. It would prevent breaking any business applications.

In its current rendition, I have been using it for two years.

Its stability is very good.

Its scalability is very good. It definitely scales easily.

Their support is okay. We get support through Insight, which is also our CSP. They're better. I would rate them a five out of ten.

Neutral

On the endpoint side, I've used Sophos and Symantec. We switched because of the integration between all different securities.

The deployment was relatively easy, but when you get into turning on the switches, things can get complicated because it has a lot of different features. Overall, it was easy.

We did it in-house. We had two security systems engineers doing it. 

We have seen a return on investment, but it is hard to give metrics. It has definitely allowed us to maintain a small team and increase our security posture. 

If you're on Microsoft products, and you've bought into what they're doing with Teams Voice and Office, then adding in the security piece is just a slight bump. You go with the E5 licensing, which saves you a lot of money.

With the bundling that Microsoft does, we have saved money. Buying individual point products would've cost us a lot more money than one integrated solution that also capitalizes on Teams Voice and things of that nature. Given our size, buying individual products would have easily cost us a million dollars.

We've looked at other solutions. We've looked at CrowdStrike. We've looked at Symantec. We went for Microsoft because of the full integration. The breadth of the products and the pricing were the main reasons.

I would advise following those secure scores and watching out as you start to communicate with your user base because you're going to impact applications.

To a security colleague who says that it is better to go with a best-of-breed strategy rather than a single vendor’s security suite, my response would be that you got to measure trying to do the integration because with security, to me, bringing that integration together is the key thing. You need to know how quickly you are going to be able to move from your detection to your mitigation. Are you going to turn on things on the firewalls or can you go right to the devices and isolation? The best of the breed is great, but trying to get them all to work together becomes very complex.

I would rate it an eight out of ten.

Microsoft Defender is a Windows platform that can be integrated with various solutions. It has a complete dashboard that gives us clear visibility into the total security of things, the endpoint devices connected, and their status. It also gives us information about who has been logged in and at what time. Compared to other solutions, Microsoft Defender for Endpoint gives us more visibility and threat analysis reports.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint has improved my security score very well. Since it is a fully automated solution, all false positives have been ruled out for me. The investigations provided by the dashboard have compliance functionality and are useful for auditing purposes.

The solution's latest features for threat analysis are updated to provide us with future protection against the latest threats worldwide. It allows us to prepare from our side for the worst scenarios so that the business operations would not be affected.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint should include better automation that will make it faster to detect the latest threats happening across the world. The solution should also generate an automatic report for any investigation before I generate a report. The solution's cost could be improved as it is an expensive tool.

I have been using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint for four years.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a highly stable solution.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a scalable solution. We have around 3,000 total endpoint devices with two administrators, and we have plans to increase the usage.

The solution's technical support is good. We were able to get proper support from the technical support team.

Positive

The solution’s initial setup is easy.

The solution’s deployment took almost three weeks. Two network engineers and I ensured the configuration of the group policies. We ensured that all the inbound and outbound traffic was properly configured and implemented.

We have seen a return on investment with Microsoft Defender for Endpoint.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is an expensive solution.

Before choosing Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, we evaluated other solutions by Azure. We chose Microsoft Defender for Endpoint because of its better functionalities and capabilities.

The solution provides us with clear visibility. We have a clear dashboard analysis, and we don't need to worry about the changes we need to make as it gives a clear solution for us. Threat hunting is the best feature that gives the response to any event happening.

The solution helps me prioritize threats across our enterprise because I'm able to map all the devices across my enterprise. It is improving my security score compared to the earlier one. Compared to our earlier endpoint protection solutions, we have a good edge over the mapping we have with Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. Any new devices getting added to our ecosystem are getting secured in a better way.

We use more than one Microsoft security product. We have integrated all of these products, and it was easy to integrate them.

The integrated Microsoft security solutions work natively together to deliver coordinated detection and response across our environment. This is very important for us because we follow a framework where protection, detection, response, and recovery have to happen in a seamless manner.

Microsoft security products give visibility into the information about the latest threats happening across the globe. This gives us awareness and helps us to be well-prepared before the attacks.

We use Microsoft Defender for Cloud, and we make use of its bi-directional sync capabilities. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint has both on-premises and cloud capabilities.

We use Microsoft Sentinel, which enables us to ingest data from our entire ecosystem. We have different types of endpoints. The ingestion of data gives more data and more credibility to the logs, which makes my environment more secure.

MS Sentinel enables us to investigate threats and respond holistically from one place. It provides vulnerability management and threat detection so that we'll be able to see different logs and parameters. Normally, the threat collection, detection, and response are very much important for an organization.

MS Sentinel’s built-in SOAR and UEBA are different higher-end functionalities with artificial intelligence that provide a secure environment for any platform. It can analyze more volumes of data.

Compared to MS Sentinel, SOAR solutions are more costly.

Our Microsoft security solution helps automate routine tasks and help automate the finding of high-value alerts. It gives us a clear investigation report to find the RCA appropriately, thereby speeding up our response time.

Our Microsoft security solution has helped eliminate having to look at multiple dashboards and given us one XDR dashboard. I can integrate all my security parameters into one dashboard, and looking for the management review is easy for me.

The solution’s threat intelligence helps prepare us for potential threats before they hit and to take proactive steps. It alerts me immediately from which IP the threat is coming so that I can block that respective port immediately and prevent it from entering my network.

Our Microsoft security solution has saved us time by making the operations faster and reducing the response time. The solution has saved me almost 15 days in a month.

Our Microsoft security solution has saved us money by providing a single integrated solution and eliminating the need for different security solutions.

The solution has decreased our time to detect and respond. The solution has enabled me to act quickly on any issue before it hits me.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a one-stop solution for your protection, and it gives overall visibility of your endpoint devices. You can easily add on the devices whenever the enterprise is growing.

With Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, you can club your endpoint protection, email protection, network protection, and application protection and ensure they are in good hands. We can handle anything regarding security operations, investigations, or complaints from a single point.

Overall, I rate Microsoft Defender for Endpoint a nine out of ten.

We deploy the solution for our customers, typically with Plan 1, as they generally have E3 licenses. We also use Microsoft Purview, the compliance system consolidating every security aspect into its portal. This offers centralized management and tight integration with Azure and Intune, which are identity and device management tools, respectively.

Our customers have a variety of cloud providers; Azure and GCP are the most popular, but we have some AWS users too. 

We use multiple Microsoft security products, including Azure Information Protection and DLP, in addition to the other flavors of Defender, such as Defender for Cloud and Defender for Identity.  

We integrated all of these products and the integration was easy. 

These solutions work natively together to deliver coordinated detection and response across our environment, which is essential. The beauty of Microsoft is the tight integration of their various products.  

The solution helps us prioritize threats across the enterprise, which is essential for every organization. If a malicious actor or another type of threat gets into the network, we need to know exactly what's happening, how it happened, who triggered it, lateral movement, etc.  

Defender for Endpoint is a 360° solution that sees and covers all areas. Microsoft also has a zero-day protection framework, so they are thinking ahead.

The product decreased our time to detect and respond to threats.

Defender for Endpoint provides good visibility into threats and has favorable threat intelligence. 

The product helps us automate routine tasks and the finding of high-value alerts; it discovers all threats and categorizes them as low, medium, or high priority, then begins remediation automatically based on the threat severity. It's also possible to automate the isolation from the production network of a device infected with ransomware. As always, the workflows and configurations should be optimized based on the environment.

The solution's threat intelligence helps us prepare for potential threats and take proactive steps before they hit. Some bots take care of remediation and an automatic ticketing system whereby open items trigger tickets sent to the team concerned.  

The solution has minimal customization options, especially compared to Mandiant, so we want to see more scope for customization. A single portal for customization would also be a welcome addition. 

A high level of expertise is required to maximize visibility into threats as the tool provides the data, but it isn't crystal clear. Other products are more straightforward and user-friendly, so admin and management-level staff can easily understand the root cause of a threat, which isn't the case with Microsoft. The threat detection and response are there, but significant expertise is required if we want the same level of visibility provided by third-party tools.

There are some issues around ingesting data from MS Sentinel. If we configure Purview, then our compliance is configured for our entire Microsoft tenant, but the integration isn't easy, and there are some known challenges.

We can't see all the data in one place, so we have to log into different portals to access various data, and this needs to be more straightforward. We want to see a single portal with one URL, so those with the appropriate credentials can gain access and see the big picture regarding the threat landscape.

We've been using the solution for over five years. 

The product is stable. 

Defender for Endpoint is scalable.

The deployment was relatively straightforward, but one issue is the knowledge base articles are not particularly accessible.

Regarding implementation strategy, we do discovery, make an assessment, and match with business needs; then, we know precisely what we have to do and which license is required. We can then start the implementation and deployment.

For maintenance, two team members are sufficient to manage 5,000 users or devices. 

We're a service provider, so we carry out the deployments ourselves. 

We have seen an ROI. 

I'm not too familiar with costs as I'm an architect, though I know about online pricing, as I help two teams with online purchasing and procurement. Nowadays, everyone has an enterprise agreement, such as an E3 license, which we provide to our customers.

The solution saved us money. 

We evaluated many solutions, including Mandiant, Cortex XDR, McAfee MVISION, and Fortinet FortiClient.

I rate the solution nine out of ten, and I recommend it.

We use Microsoft Sentinel, and it allows us to ingest data from our entire ecosystem.

Sentinel enables us to investigate threats and respond holistically from one place, which is important to us.  

Initially, I was running a different endpoint security program but it did not have a dashboard that met my needs. It would only do on-premises. If laptops, desktops, or VDIs were remote, such as people working from home or in a different office, my VDIs—which are really just on-premises but they're in a separate subnet in VMware, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 11, 2008, all the way up to 2022—I could only get the servers that were on-prem. That solution had a management console but there was no integrated console within Microsoft so that I could cover all bases. I deployed Defender for Endpoint and now I'm able to see them in there. For some, I've still got the old AMP on them, but Defender will run in passive mode and let AMP run and report to its own console.

The reason I don't want to run AMP, primarily, is that it's a resource hog. Defender for Endpoint integrates it and automatically comes with the Windows operating system or Windows Server Desktop. Plus I can use Defender for IoT and see, on my network—which is a home lab company—my routers, my switches, and, believe it or not, my televisions and refrigerators; the IoT devices that I might have on my network. And that integrates into Defender for Endpoint.

And with Sentinel, I'm hoping to pull that into logs that I have for my cloud-based and on-premises-based servers so I have one pane of glass that will alert me if something is going on. It will correlate those logs from Defender on every endpoint and put them into one incident if there are alerts to be had.

It probably could help me prepare for potential threats before they hit. The nice thing about it is that it has filtering. I can filter on different logs and say, "I'm looking for this user and every place he ever logged into. I can filter on his name and the scope of the machines I'm looking at. If there's a bad actor, a different version of software, I can pull that up. It has simple filtering and advanced filters, which really help out a lot. It does speed things up.

I rely a lot on Defender for Endpoint to find a lot of stuff for me. With Microsoft knowing about a threat in the wild, something that hasn't hit me yet but it's out there and I'm vulnerable to it, it will detect those vulnerable systems for me. I rely on that to patch or update that operating system.

When you install an OS, it could be a year old, it could be brand-new, or it could be five years old and it's not patched and updated. Sometimes there are apps on it, from Google or Adobe for example. This will tell me that my Adobe Acrobat has so many vulnerabilities and that I need to bring it up to this date because I've got 13 vulnerabilities that could be hacked. I rely on it quite a bit to pull those notices together and alert me on what needs to be updated. I don't have to actually hunt for a lot of it. It does the hunting for me automatically.

The features I found to be most valuable in Defender for Endpoint are its alerting, policies, and threat-hunting.

For threat-hunting, I'll put some threats in a test scenario. I've downloaded known viruses that are out in the public for testing. They're not really a virus but they've got a signature. Defender for Endpoint will automatically find those, quarantine them for me, and alert me to what it did. It gives me "automated eyes."

A lot of it is hands-off. It just deploys and it updates by itself. With other applications, like McAfee or AMP, I'll have to download a new version and make sure that the signatures were applied. With Defender, one of the things I like is that it has automatic updates.

And Defender has other integrations with Microsoft that are of benefit. It will tell me that certificates are out of date for my certificate server; I've deployed certificates to my laptops or VDIs or servers or switches. There's an automation routine that I can kick in using KQL—Kustom Query Language—so that it automatically remediates the issues that it finds.

And the visibility into threats that Defender for Endpoint provides is fantastic. Since it is a Microsoft product, and they have it deployed worldwide, they pull over a couple of trillion data points a day from other companies and countries. They've got teams of security analysts or researchers who are constantly updating these and they feed me that information. I'll know about a threat that might be down the road or I might be susceptible to, something that I could patch. It tells me if there is a known fix or if there isn't, in which case I might have to go in a different direction. It's the might behind Microsoft. It pulls in all that information so everybody else can see it.

In addition, with the data connectors for Azure or containers or even M365, threats are automatically classified as high, medium, low, or informational. If they're not classified, I can classify them myself or set a priority on them as to whether they need to be looked at right away, whether they're active or in process or resolved.

Microsoft security products provide a little more comprehensive protection than some of the other offerings. One great thing about it is that it's part of the operating system and it's already turned on when you deploy the OS.

But if you do have a third party, like AMP or McAfee for example, Defender will run in passive mode. That means it's not constantly doing a scan, virus check, or malware check. Still, if you open an email, write a document, or load a USB key to copy files, it would scan in all those situations. But in passive mode, it scans once a day, I believe. It does a device discovery and it will tell you, "We found this software, we found these documents, you did have malware or a virus and it has been quarantined." And that's in passive mode.

If you put it in active mode, without the third-party virus and malware checkers, Defender for Endpoint will give you a software inventory and a timeline of every key that was clicked in case you had a bad actor that infiltrated your network or your machine. If an employee went to a rogue support site and downloaded some software, and let somebody in, it would alert me through UEBA: "There is unique behavior that we don't normally see from this person. They don't normally access this site. The alert would tell me which site had been accessed and that software had been downloaded. It would tell me the time it was installed and what it did—every keystroke. That's with Defender for Endpoint being active.

In active mode, it's great that it gives you so much information, but it does record every keystroke so you have a lot of logs. For my home business, I had to turn off quite a bit because the data that it does gather is every event and activity that happens on a server or laptop. For my little testing scenario, it was overwhelming.

I know what I have on my machines so that amount of data logging started to add up in the cost. That's the only downside to Sentinel and Defender that I can see so far: You have to log and store that data somewhere, and it normally stores it in the cloud, unless you have an on-premises SIEM that you can download those logs into directly and store things on your own hard drives.

I had a $200 credit with Microsoft Azure and I didn't pay attention to it and it ate up $179 of that credit in the first two days because I had Defender for Endpoint check DNS to make sure that I wasn't getting spoofed or targeted.

You have to keep an eye on the Sentinel and Defender for Endpoint storage.

I have been using Defender for Endpoint since about November, so about three months.

It's pretty stable.

With a browser or web-based system, it might confuse things, saying, "You don't have access," because you should have logged in with your admin credentials but you logged in with your standard user credentials because you are on the same desktop.

For my home business I just have basic support. I submit a ticket and they get back to me in a couple of days.

Positive

My company isn't off the ground yet, it's basically going to be a family medical practice run by my wife and me. I'm an IT guy and she's a nurse practitioner and, eventually, she wants to work for herself. I'm doing the background and since I do use it for my regular job, I'm doing this on my own labs as well with trial software or things I've bought subscriptions for. I've bought Microsoft E5 so a lot of it is out-of-pocket and on a shoestring budget.

The nice thing about Defender and Sentinel is that the cost is based on the data logs that you ingest from the Defender endpoints and data connectors. I don't have to buy a 25- or 50- or 1,000-user or enterprise license. I can buy one license at a time. For small mom-and-pop shops, that's very important. A lot of startups don't have that kind of budget for enterprise-wide scalability, especially when they don't have many devices in the first place.

Defender for IoT is an add-on to Defender for Endpoint. It's there, but you have to onboard it. I don't really have enough devices, other than my home base, but in a regular business it would find all the switches, routers, security cameras, monitors, printers, modems, and anything else you have attached. With Defender for Endpoint, you need to have an operating system—Linux, Windows, et cetera—to deploy it.

A refrigerator or a camera or a security device doesn't really have a Windows-based operating system on which to deploy the agent. So IoT, within Defender, will scan those devices, find them, and let you know that it found them. It does that out-of-the-box with Defender for Endpoint. If you want to see the actual operating system of IoT devices and get alerts that something is out of date or has vulnerabilities, you have to get a subscription to IoT, which I hope to do.

There's a lot to learn when it comes to using Defender for Endpoint to automate routine tasks and find high-value alerts. KQL is a structured query language for hunting. If I have data ingestion from M365 logs, Defender for Containers, Defender for Storage, and AWS, Defender for Endpoint or Sentinel will allow me to hook up connectors to pull all of those logs into a "master database" with different tables that contain those logs. There are routines that are already written that say, "If you're looking for this type of an event that started with this application that went to a SQL server that was stored on this server that was accessed from a laptop where the guy went through a browser and went to this particular rogue network," and they access all those tables in that master database.

KQL allows me to tap into each of those different tables and correlate like events or like data, and pull it all into an alert or a threat hunt. It's something to master. It's sort of like regular SQL, but there are a lot of tables and schemas and you have to know what the tables and headers and columns and fields are, and then the syntax. It does threat-hunting really well with the canned queries that it has. But if you're looking for something in particular, you need to learn KQL. A SQL Server database admin would know SQL and how to pull data out of tables and do joins, commits, and transaction rollbacks. KQL is on that same level where you have to be an expert in KQL to actually pull all that stuff together. It's quite the learning curve, but there are courses out there that teach you.

I've been doing systems administration and engineering server admin things for quite some time, a couple of decades since Windows came out, and a little bit before that. But jumping over into the security space for my home business, and putting all these things together with Defender and Sentinel, has been a learning curve. It has slowed me down a little bit. A while back, security was always an issue for security teams. Now that I'm working on my own company, I'm a one-man show. But at the same time, I know there are a lot of bad actors out there.

I used MDE to investigate individual alerts. We were able to initiate AV scans on devices from MDE. That was our normal practice as soon as we pulled up an alert. My understanding was that it wouldn't slow down the throughput or the productivity of the endpoint device. We could theoretically isolate the device via MDE.

We also used Cloud App Security, Microsoft Defender for Cloud, and Azure Sentinel. At my last two organizations, they were in the process of moving from Splunk to the Microsoft security suite. It was standard procedure for us to install MDE on Microsoft Defender as the endpoint solution for every device. We didn't have anything on-premises.

I have experience with Microsoft Sentinel. We were transitioning toward using that as our SIEM. They encouraged us to learn the Kusto Query Language, which is extremely useful.

My organization was in the process of using Sentinel to ingest data from their entire ecosystem.

The solution was deployed across multiple departments and multiple locations in North America. It was deployed on a private cloud.

MDE eliminates the need to look at multiple dashboards, given it has only one XDR dashboard. It has a good user interface for looking at campaigns and the big picture as opposed to just one incident. They also have good graphics.

MDE decreased the time it takes to do detection and response. It allows us to quickly look at the timeline and see what caused the alert. In my organization, they wanted to know what caused the alert, not just whether or not it was a false positive. 

If there is malware on a device, they wanted to know how it got there. If there is malware on the device from another device in our environment, that is a huge deal. If someone clicked on something in an email or went to a suspicious website on their own, that is extremely important to determine quickly in our environment. It's very helpful to determine the level of the threat.

The investigation aspect is the most useful. It's user-friendly and has a good user interface. There's a universal search bar at the top of MDE. Plugging in the hostname brings up the page for the host. From there, we can see any alerts and an overview of the host, who it's assigned to, and who is logged into it.

I usually quickly go straight to the alerts tab and start investigating the alerts. It has a really great timeline function on it. It shows everything that occurred on the device and any connections it made on the internet or with other devices on the network. It shows activities like who logged in and who logged off. I could pull all of that through the timeline and figure out what happened and why it happened. The investigative capabilities are really good.

MDE provides pretty good visibility into threats. I would give it an A-. Overall, I was pretty impressed by it.

Sentinel enables us to investigate threats and respond holistically from just one place. Sentinel's security protection is pretty good. We had some alerts that we considered for a potential campaign. There were some instances when we had the AI perform an investigation for us, and it was pretty comprehensive.

MDE helps automate routine tasks. This was at a level higher than mine, but the automation seemed to work well for them. They had some queries and other tasks that they would schedule and set up alerts for.

MDE has also saved us time.

One of our main problems in cybersecurity is dealing with noise. If you look at the logs for any device over a 10-minute period, it's just too much information. The timeline on MDE is very good at whittling down the noise to find the answers to our questions.

I would like MDE to have the ability to isolate a certain amount of time on the timeline. Splunk has a better UI when it comes to isolating a certain amount of time. I need to know exactly what happened two minutes prior to and two minutes after an incident. I don't need to see half an hour's worth of information.

With Splunk, the UI is perfect. With just a couple of clicks of a button, it'll show us 30 seconds prior to and 30 seconds after an incident. The timeline for MDE is more difficult to understand.

After a failed log-in, Splunk shows when the event happened on the timeline down to a thousandth of a second. Theoretically, we could do that with the Kusto language, but that would mean changing the query every time. It's just not as user-friendly as it could be.

I used MDE for two years.

The stability is great.

I used Carbon Black and McAfee ePO in my previous organization, but they were in the process of moving everything to the Microsoft security solution.

Splunk was our main SIEM and alert system. It pulled alerts from different sources. When we received an alert, Splunk would quickly give us basic information, and then we would go straight to MDE. We received a lot more information from MDE's alerts than we did from Splunk.

I didn't spend a lot of time with Splunk. I normally input the hostname of the affected device that triggered the alert. I pulled all of the information from there, like the timeline of the event, the IOCs it had spotted, the name of the alert, and all of the other details. From there, I did a full investigation of the alert through MDE. I was very impressed with MDE. It gives great details, and it's very easy to use.

We didn't have dedicated personnel for any problems. We purchased full support with the license. Setup wasn't flawless, but there weren't any major issues.

I would rate this solution as eight out of ten.

If you have the money for it, I would recommend the Microsoft security solution.

I would recommend a single-vendor strategy if you have the money for it. I believe in defense in depth. Regarding endpoint protection, I think it's better to stick with one vendor. In my previous organization, they had conflicts between MDE and McAfee. McAfee would read MDE as a virus, and MDE would read McAfee as a virus.

The problem with endpoints is that if you have more than one solution, each of those solutions will see the other guy as a virus or potential virus. When it comes to endpoint protection, I would go with a single vendor.