RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets (RSA SIEM) Reviews

The primary use case of this solution is for security.

We use the UEBA tool.

What we are mainly using are the RSA Concentrator, RSA Decoder, Archiver, Broker, and Log Decoder.

Security needs improvement.

We would still like to know how the traffic is entering the organization. We can find out but it will take time before we know, leaving the organization vulnerable for attack.

There is no SIEM tool in the world that can provide 100% security.

I have been using this solution for five months.

Stability has not been an issue with this product.

It's a scalable solution.

The initial setup was straightforward, not at all complex.

There are approximately 1,400 devices that are integrated into RSA in my organization. While I was not a part of the integration, from my knowledge, it would take a week.

We have looked at similar systems and find that the architecture is somewhat different, yet the functionality is similar.

This is a product that I recommend.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

We are a solution provider and RSA NetWitness is one of the products that we implement for our clients. We also use it ourselves, They primarily use it for threat protection.

The most valuable feature is the security that it provides.

The log-related capabilities are good.

It integrates well with other risk-assessment tools.

It is not so easy to customize this product.

This product would be improved with the addition of machine learning functionality.

I have been working with this product for perhaps eight years.

Stability is not a problem with NetWitness.

We have not heard any complaints about scalability. This is generally for enterprise-level companies.

The technical support is good and our customers are satisfied with it.

We use McAfee for internal purposes.

The complexity of the initial setup depends on the environment, but overall, I would say that it is quite easy. It isn't the easiest product to install, although it is not difficult, either.

They have just introduced an orchestration tool, although I don't know how it works yet.

Overall, this is a good product and I recommend it. However, I always suggest doing a proof of concept first, to make sure that it meets your needs.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

Our primary use case is real-time threat prediction so that we can minimize the person-hours of IT security analysts.

The most valuable features are the threat prediction and network forensics. For example, if there is any malware on the network, I am able to see who received it and who clicked on it. I like this functionality the most.

The deployment of the appliance is easy, where even a non-technical person can configure it.

The SOAR (security orchestration, automation, and response) component has areas for improvement.

Technical support needs to be improved.

Integration with third-party products for industries such as the banking sector, or telecommunications, presents challenges that require help from the OEM.

Lots of competing products have vulnerability protection built into their products, and this solution would be improved by including that support.

We have been using RSA NetWitness for about 10 years.

There are no issues in terms of stability.

This solution is pretty scalable, as I am using the VM infrastructure. It can scale to whatever you need.

I am not happy with the RSA support. Sometimes they can be really annoying because it takes so long to get the support that you need.

I have used RSA enVision and ArcSight in the past. We migrated from RSA enVision because they had declared the product end-of-life and upgraded to the NetWitness platform.

The Logs component is similar to what other competitors, such as IBM, ArcSight, and LogRhythm have. What distinguishes this solution is the Packets component. It is critical and something that people should make use of.

It is easy to deploy the appliance. Anyone can mount and configure it. There is a simple, pre-built OS that they just need to mount in the VM infrastructure, and that is clearly mentioned in the documentation. It will take two or three days to deploy, at most.

The challenge comes with trying to integrate with third-party application servers. 

We deployed this solution with our in-house team.

The number of people required for maintenance depends on your use case. If you are only using it to maintain the infrastructure then two staff is sufficient. However, if you want to implement a full-fledged SOC then you will need at least four or five people.

My advice for anybody who is implementing this solution is to look at both their endpoints and circuit paths. The two components, Logs and Packets, should definitely both be considered. Even if there is an on-premises SIEM log, they can integrate it.

Overall, I feel that the product is very good and my biggest complaint is about their support.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

I am currently working in a security operations center and RSA NetWitness Log and Packets is part of our security solution. We use it for log management and anomaly identification. It is used for compliance as well because it has a log archiving capability that will span at least a couple of years.

We are also using it to facilitate monitoring and research.

Performance and reporting are very good. 

The user interface is a little bit difficult for new users and it needs to be improved.

It takes a lot of time to register when compared to other solutions.

I have been using this solution for about one year, although it has been in the company for a couple of years.

We did have some issues before our upgrade from version 10.6., although they were not major. Since the upgrade, I have noticed that some of these things have gotten better.

I would say that this is a stable solution, although there are some minor issues that need to be settled. Currently, they are being investigated.

We have never had issues with scalability. We can reduce the usage as per our requirement and we increased our capacity in 2019. We are planning to further increase, either this year or next year. Scalability overall is quite easy.

When we started finding problems, we got in touch with technical support and opened tickets. They worked with us to resolve them. I would rate them good, although not great. At times, I felt that they were being really short with me.

I was not part of the initial setup but my understanding is that there were no issues and everything was good. I was part of the upgrade from version 10.6 to 11.3 and it was smooth, with no major issues.

The deployment was done by my manager a couple of years ago.

My advice to anybody who is considering this solution is that it is a relatively good program, but you want to take some time to get used to it. Once it is deployed and you are used to it, you can do whatever you want. Orchestration is another element that is there.

I would recommend this solution for large organizations that need to be compliant with these types of things. My main complaint is about the user interface.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

 Our customers are enterprise-level businesses.

The most valuable features are the integration and ease of use. It is a pretty simple platform that can integrate very well with our system.

The documentation is not as structured as I would like, personally, and I think that it can be improved and made much more user-friendly. I may see it differently than other people.

I would like to see a little question mark beside each button that you can click and find out what that button is for. It would make it much easier for people who are new to the solution. Like a pop-up appearing when hovering over the question mark, attached to each main action and split into branches. 

We began using RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets not long ago.

This is a very stable product.

I have not been in contact with technical support.

I would say that RSA University is fair and square. It is a bit tricky because they have changed the learning platform and I had trouble enrolling in courses. I needed to contact Dell EMC support, which is the same support for RSA, and they assigned the courses to me in one or two hours. In the end, I was very satisfied. It is a bit expensive but the companies are paying for it.

The initial setup is straightforward. I am also coding so it is easy for me to adapt.

I have also worked with RSA SecurID and I can say that from the moment I touched it, it has been very easy for me to use.

The company is very active on the market and it is improving continuously. EMC/RSA are trying to approach a build such that it can meet every user's needs, but you can't satisfy everyone.

I recommend RSA NetWitness alongside other products, although I would suggest this first because of the user-friendly interface and easy-to-manipulate options. The only issue I have is with the documentation.

Overall, this is a good solution with suitable features and it very well fits our needs.

I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.

The RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets solution was set up as part of the SOC. It is set up on two sides. One is for the Data Center (DC) side, and the other is for the Disaster Recovery (DR) side.

The most valuable feature is that we can create our own connectors for any application, and NetWitness provides the training and tools to do it. With some other solutions, creating custom connectors is very costly.

The dashboard is very simple to use.

The initial setup is very complex and should be simplified.

We had some trouble integrating with our Check Point firewall.

I used RSA NetWitness for a couple of months in my previous company.

It was too early to say whether this solution was stable because you need at least a year to determine that. In the initial stages, we were still getting a lot of alerts because there was no time to fine-tune it. Maybe after six or eight months, we would have been able to say whether the product was stable. Just before reaching that point, I left the organization.

What I can say is that for the time I was there, we did not experience any bugs, crashes, or glitches.

This solution is scalable. We had between 20 and 25 users, although, on a daily basis, I would say that 13 to 16 people used it.

We did not interact with technical support because we were working with the vendor, and the vendor was working with them.

We tried to implement Paladion but we were not about to complete our PoC because of problems.

The initial setup is very complex. It requires having knowledge of what components do and which go where. An example is knowing which component will fetch data and where it goes. This is very difficult for somebody new and a person should have a minimum of one to two years of work experience.

Our deployment of the two solutions and having them work simultaneously took between four and five months.

We have an in-house team, but the vendor gave us support as well. The initial setup was very tough, which is why it took four or five months to implement everything and make sure that it was configured as per our requirements.

There were six people involved in the deployment. Three from the vendor's team and three from my team. They were working day and night to make sure that things worked well.

The number of people required for maintenance depends on the hours of operation. If the business hours are 24/7 for the entire year then two people are required for maintenance.

We did not evaluate other options.

My advice for anybody who is implementing this solution is to make sure that the team handling the deployment is skilled. Without support, they will not be able to do it at all.

Also, if somebody wants to make their own connectors then they will need to have a development team. Without knowledge of scripting, it is not possible to make connectors. So, I would say that at an early point there needs to be somebody specialized in the use of this product.

I would rate this solution a six out of ten.

We are a service providing company and this is one of the products that we implement for our clients. The RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets solution is used for Event Stream Analysis (ESA), and we implement use cases based on our customers' needs. For example, suppose the security device is a Palo Alto device then at the policy level, we implement the use cases. These might be things like phishing attacks or a botnet. Most companies follow the GDPR regulations for compliance.

We have RSA NetWitness implemented in virtual appliances.

The most valuable features are the packet decoder, log decoder, and concentrator. The packet decoder is capable of collecting the flow, whereas the log decoder is capable of collecting the event. NetWitness offers a hybrid solution that collects both and also uses the concentrator.

The alert dashboard is not reflecting events in real-time. We have to refresh in order to view an alert in real-time.

Log aggregation is an issue with this solution because there are a huge number of alerts in a single instance. Compared to ArcSight or QRadar, this is a problem.

We have been using RSA NetWitness for about a year and a half.

The stability of RSA NetWitness is good. It is used on a daily basis.

The ability to scale varies from client to client, and what the client's requirements are. Sometimes the client will want to move to a lighter platform and you have to consider the many inputs related to the cloud. 

We are supporting 10 to 15 clients for this solution. 

With regard to technical support, we have found that their diagnosis makes sense but in some cases, they are very late to reply. Our clients always want to resolve the issue through us, and sometimes the support takes a long time. Because RSA NetWitness is a new product, there are many things that they are trying to find out.

Overall, I would say that the support is good.

We are using multiple tools including QRadar, RSA NetWitness, LogRhythm, and Micro 
Focus ArcSight.

The QRadar setup gave us no issues, and it also works with logs and packets.

LogRhythm fulfills the GDPR compliance.

The initial setup is good, and it is not complex.

The length of time it takes to deploy depends on the type and size of the organization. It takes two to three days to implement this solution, including all of the installation and configuration. Once the company provides the requirements then we implement as per the organizational policy. 

We implement this solution using our in-house team, although if an issue should occur during installation then we can raise a ticket with support. We have had issues with difficult deployments because of the database during installation, which has lead to using the support portal. 

The number of people required for deployment and maintenance depends on how many logs are being integrated. Suppose there are 100 or 200 logs, then 10 people will be sufficient if they focus on deployment and troubleshooting. It also depends on the timeline. If the timeline is longer then five people are enough to complete the implementation.

Many clients are not able to purchase the packet capability because there is a huge amount of data, and the cost depends on the number of EPS (Events per second), as well as the number of gigabytes of data per day. 

My advice to anybody who is researching this solution is to consider the differences between the hardware and the virtual solution. The hardware is okay, but if you have any issues and need to restart then it is easy to do this with the VM. My preference is using the VM, where they can easily increase the size of storage if necessary.

It is important to remember that ESA takes all of the main memory. The minimum requirement is 96 GB of RAM, and this is very easy to implement on a virtual machine. My advice is to implement ESA using the maximum eligibility criteria. Consider what the hardware requires are in terms of RAM and storage, and use the maximum available for ESA.

This solution has a very good dashboard with a separate tab for incidents and alerts. There is a ticketing tool as well. If the problems with the dashboard are corrected then we will not need to have any other tools. The dashboard is a very important feature for clients.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

We use the on-premise deployment model of this solution. Our primary use case of this solution is for malware detection and for reconstruction during the incident and forensic analysis.

The web interface needs improvement because right now they have problems combining an older interface with a newer interface. They're in the middle of the process of combining the old and the new one. It sometimes confuses the user and sometimes you are not able to find the necessary information. You need to click the information and that is something that should be improved.

The data isn't a problem but you need to get used to it. You need to know where to click in order to get the results. Otherwise, you can encounter some problems.

I would be very happy if they would fix all the issues from 11.3 to the 11.4 version to have more advantages from the UEBA because the UEBA we have implemented will be the longest. If they will fully integrate the UEBA with the network data, this could be a very huge advantage and impact on the market. Right now, you have a solution like Darktrace which has the same capabilities as RSA NetWitness so NetWitness should implement the same things. They have UEBA, they have data. They should implement algorithms to digest that data and produce additional, more advanced reporting, alerting and support of internal security teams.

It's very stable if you are talking about the old version. I don't like 11.3 and I don't know 11.4, it's not actually released. It provides accurate information, quick analysis from the endpoint perspective, and quick identification of any potential malware. But the 11.3 version is a complete disaster. You cannot analyze anything. 

I am part of the maintenance team. It's me and a couple more staff members that don't work full-time on this solution. I would say around four employees are required for maintenance but not full-time. 

It's fully scalable. There is no limit. Of course, the license limits per day the number of terabytes. In my opinion, it's very flexible.

We have 10,000 users using this solution.

We do plan to increase the usage of this solution. We want to implement more monitoring of the internal traffic from specific places. We need to implement more decoders, more concentrators, and some kind of organization with the log archiving. 

Their customer service is excellent, one of the best.

I have been using Fidelis and that works. It's all the same approach, but they only gather the metadata, not the full packet capture. If you want to compare those products together, I can safely say that RSA is much better because they offer full packet capture capability. It's more scalable and more flexible.

The initial set up was not very complex. The problem is with the use cases. You need to be very careful to not become overwhelmed with unnecessary data. You need to very carefully decide what should be filtered, what you need to be taken from the network or from the logs. You need to decide whether you need YouTube traffic at all, for example, because it consumes storage. It's a huge amount of data and that data is useless. It is not relevant to malicious activity and if you want to fully get the picture of the user activity or the motor activity you can have with data without Facebook, for example.

We have a perpetual license, so the total cost of ownership is not very expensive. It's a good investment.

We have looked through the Cisco solution to expand more devices from Fidelis to cover more areas of our network. I also evaluated Symantec and I have seen FireEye but it's hard to even compare those products to RSA.

If it's possible, ask for help from primary support to help you implement at the very beginning with the fundamental alert or detection rules. This is my best advice for a customer regardless of the size and scope of the implementation. Use the support to help you with the implementation process.

I would rate it an eight out of ten. 

We are no longer using this solution, however, it was used mostly for network monitoring. 

The most valuable feature is the ability to write rules and triggers for network communication and then being able to investigate based on that. You can see the payload and deconstruct the packets.

The solution would be greatly improved by unifying the management to one configuration option. One of the problems the system had is that you always have to choose the managed host. For example, if you want to write a rule, you have to duplicate it across your managed hosts. It should have centralized management. If you want to make a change then it should be configured automatically, so that you don't need to go one by one, changing it. That is really annoying.

Another problem is that the EPL (Event Processing Language) is not properly explained, and the expert could not even use it when they came to our site. It was causing the system to crash, so they should really consider using something else.

The system looks like it is a mix of a bunch of different systems, and nothing looked like it was quite together. I think that it could be better integrated, and it would be great for new customers or even existing customers.

I cannot say that the solution was stable because it tended to crash. We were using it before version 11, where some of the problems were supposed to be solved. I have heard from insiders that version 11 does not hold up to the hype and they're still facing some of the same problems.

I think that the solution is scalable because you can easily add news hosts. This is one of the things that was really straightforward and we appreciated. 

The people that we spoke with from technical support were really professional. Some visited us on-site and did some training with our analysists. They are really good staff and we really liked it. The company that did the integration at the site where I was working was planning on re-hiring them for other customers, so they made a good impression.

The support is responsive by email, but initially, it is a little bit lacking. Beyond the initial emails, it is quite professional.

I was not part of the initial setup, but I can tell you that managing the system, in general, is not straightforward. It is quite elusive and very confusing, even after calls to technical support.

This is a pricey solution; it's not cheap.

Perhaps if the implementation is small then it is not bad, but if you have a global network or a security agency that needs to be segregated on the network, then it can be quite pricey.

This solution has some good features, but it is lacking in usability. This means that I would rate it somewhere in the middle. I would rate this solution a five out of ten.

We don't have a primary use case. There are many use cases that we have defined based on business needs.

The most valuable features are its

• ingestion of logs 
• raising of alerts based on those logs.

I'd like to see improvement in its ease of use. It's basically unusable. It's overly complex.

We used RSA as our consultants. Our experience with them wasn't the most productive. We also have various other consultants in to help as well. Their ability to configure this particular platform is limited because it's such a complex product. There are so many classes you need to take in order to be proficient at it. There are so few people on the planet who can do it. You need an army of people to keep this thing going.

It's supposed to help our security program maturity. Has it? I think that's another question.

I rate this product at three out of ten. It is overly complicated. It has taken years to implement and the return on investment just isn't there.

Our primary use case is for the administration of the internal network.

The detection of ransomware in the internal network has benefited my organization.

The protection that we get from the firewall is the most valuable aspect that we get from this solution.

I would like for them to incorporate IPS. Only the monitoring detects abnormal behavior so we'd like to see IPS. 

I would like to see a dashboard include PAM so that it's a one-stop shop. 

We were using Splunk. We switched because it's difficult to configure and it demanded too many network resources. 

The initial setup was complex because it took a lot of time to complete the implementation. The deployment took three to six months. We require four people for maintenance.

We have eight users using this solution and plan to increase usage. 

The licenses are good but the cost is very expensive. 

We also looked at IBM QRadar.

I would recommend this solution to somebody considering it. 

I would rate it a nine out of ten.

Our primary use case is for detecting or monitoring the process that we use in devices, servers, or databases.

The manner in which we can manage logs and information is very important for our organization. 

The most valuable feature is the correlation. It can report in real-time and monitor the management. 

The implementation needs assistance.

The stability of this solution is good. 

This solution meets our scalability needs. 

The technical support is good. 

I was not involved in the initial setup of this solution. 

I like to say it has the trifecta:

• Good
• Beautiful
• Cheap.

It is a cheap solution. 

We use it as a network tool to alert any anomalies on the network.

It gives the ability to investigate into network traffic in the Net and the organization what we couldn't do before.

The product continues to crash. Even with tech support help, it does not resolve itself.

Yes, we have had extensive use of tech support and they have not been as helpful as we would have liked. We had the crashing issue, and we had special sessions with tech support. The UAE representative and the IR response team were both on our site, and they could not understand why the system crashes. They configured the rules and then it crashed again. It is quite frustrating.

The packet has a model that is called the extracting and it doesn't really work that well. Usually, it crashes and the re-issue improves it because it is one of the main functions that we use and it doesn't work properly.

It was very hard to implement. After implementation, we found e had to revise everything. With help of support, we eventually managed to stabilize it. But, it took a full year to do so.

The only other solution similar to this is Solera and I do not think our organization will be switching to that. 

Reliable in terms of no data loss. Plays a huge role in device health checks (Event Source Monitor). Provides FSEs relevant information prior to end user problem solutions (if data sources are integrated and parsed properly).

• Packet Solution: Allows analyst proactive hunting and alerting on daily sophisticated APTs.
• Broker service: Aggregate multiple concentrator devices deployed in various sites which accelerates analyst’s duties.
• Archiver – Does log retention for three to five years for forensics purposes or targeted investigations in the future.

Advance monitoring and alerting feature is not stable (Event Stream Analysis). Does not allow certain use cases running parallel.

The reporting module: If only their dashboards resembled anything you would see on any BI reporting tools.

More than once with fine tuning use cases (ESA feature) for real-time monitoring.

Reporting feature suddenly limits the amount of log extraction over certain cycles.

Never.

An eight out of 10. RSA tech support is awesome.

Sometimes they face huge challenges when an unknown bug hits their system and tech support must take their cases to engineering.

None in production other than RSA. However, I will be using IBM QRadar towards the end of this year.

I was never involved in setting up the solution with any of my employers. I get to learn the architecture and see the environment once it's complete.

RSA licensing ranges per core devices and services.

An additional Designated Support Engineer can be acquired at quite a pricy cost. They are reliable as your system and will be given a higher priority than any other support case(s).

Our partnership with RSA was already in place. No room for evaluation.

Top SIEM tools such as HP Arcsight, McAfee ESM, and IBM QRadar.

Either operating this solution in-house or reselling. First, outline all your data sources. Give more priority to the assets you want to protect.

Event source type and versions will be key.

Additional useful features:

• Easy to integrate common data sources.
• User friendly GUI.
• Basic SQL rule syntax.

We are using RSA Security analytics version 10.6.3.2 and upgrading to 10.6.4 in mid-September. NetWitness suite v11 is due in October as a major upgrade.

As mentioned elsewhere, this product provides full visibility for the activities in the networks and systems. For example, it provides detection of the attacks in early stages (brute-force attacks), by which the attackers try to gain access to the systems, by trying to log in using different usernames and passwords (might be in a dictionary).

RSA NetWitness is a SIEM and real-time network traffic solution. It collects logs/packets and applies a set of alerting, reporting and analysis rules on them. Thus, it provides the enterprise with a full visibility of the networks and activities of the systems.

Its main features/components are:

• Investigation Module: It is the location where the SOC analysts can find all logs/packets captured in a time-frame, that are related/non-related and have drill-down/filtration capabilities all in one table, for investigation and analysis.
• Alerting Module: It provides real-time event processing language on all the logs/packets stream for advanced alerting, i.e., using SQL LIKE statements.
• Reporting Module: It provides advanced reporting capabilities.
• Dashboard Module: It provides dashboards for specific activities on the systems and networks.
• Command and Control Detection: In additional to identifying the C&C IPs through threat intelligence, NetWitness investigates the packets to determine any type of suspicious C&C communication, by using a feature called Automated Threat Detection.
• Threat Hunting Package: By using this advanced technique, NetWitness automatically investigates all the service sessions, files/packets and then it identifies any IoCs, BoCs and EoCs.
• Context Lookup: In order to give an overview during investigation, this feature highlights any value related to the previous alert, incident, RSA ECAT feed mentioned or even if it had any comment from the RSA community, that leads to detecting any recent attack (even if it is still not announced on threat intelligence).
• Incident Module: It provides an automated incident handling utility to ensure that right actions have been taken to close the incident.
• Malware Analysis Module: It provides a file analysis environment including sandboxing, community etc., so as to investigate more of the files captured through the environment traffic.

• Out-of-the-box alerts and investigation rules
• Health monitoring of the event sources and devices
• Threat intelligence for data accuracy

We encountered stability issues in the earlier versions, and much fewer in the newer versions.

There were no scalability issues.

The new pricing and licensing mechanisms are fair. I would advise always to get the full solution (i.e., not only Logs).

I did not evaluate other solutions.

The only thing I advise others is to spend enough time for fine-tuning and the initial rule development.

You should also develop a plan for the ongoing development and fine-tuning, as found in all the other leading SIEM solutions.

Full packet capture: A must in an SOC

Possibility to investigate incidents based on logs and raw packets, such as extracting files sent over the network

Built-in Incident Management module for small security/SOC teams

Advanced correlation engine based on metadata flow: Provides nearly real time correlation

Rich reporting options

We can monitor all traffic to/from our company.

It is possible to track end user behaviour.

With RSA NetWitness Endpoint, we are able to monitor not only the network, but also what’s happening on endpoints, i.e., behaviour analytics for processes inside the operating system.

Thanks to this tool, we have a small SOC running in our company.

Integration with external tools should be built-in, such as an external sandbox for files.

We can import data using external feeds, using STIX or CVS files.

The REST API is poor

The system architecture is complex and sometimes it’s hard to troubleshoot potential problems.

RSA should improve backup options and High Availability architecture.

Data is stored on separate components without redundancy. It’s possible to have backup for data, but you have to use an external backup solution.

I have used this product for two and a half years.

The system is stable if you provide enough CPU, RAM, and HDD (IOPS). Sizing should be done by RSA Professional Services or by an experienced partner for Virtual Machines. The hardware is sized well.

There were no scalability issues, but you have to know what you are doing. Proper network deployment is important. Metadata flows are quite big between internal system components. Of course, it depends on how many network packets and logs are logged into the system.

I would give technical support a rating of 8/10. Sometimes you have to wait for an initial response, especially if it’s not a critical problem. But when they start investigating, they do it quite well.

For full packet capture, we had Blue Coat Security Analytics. We switched because in NetWitness, we have everything needed to run a small SOC in our company.(Packets, logs, endpoints, incident management module, correlation, reporting, and investigation available for analysts.)

It’s a very easy product to install, when you know what you are doing. Customers without any experience should cooperate with RSA Professional Services or a partner company. It’s too complex of a product to deploy for someone without experience. It can be done, but the value coming from RSA or a partner is incomparable.

Prepare use cases, i.e., what to do and how.

Collect information about EPS for logs and total bandwidth for packets. This will allow you to properly size the licensing.

Hardware is too expensive in my opinion (Eastern Europe). It’s cheaper to run virtual machines in a VMware environment. (Keep in mind that CPU, RAM, and especially HDD requirements must be matched.)

We had Blue Coat Security Analytics, but we’re an RSA partner so it was natural to use the technology available to us.

• Don’t rush. Prepare use cases for packets and logs as it is a very important part of deployment and future use.
• Use RSA Professional Services or a partner. Don’t deploy alone.
• A basic administration course is a must for all administrators.
• System architecture may be very easy or very complex. Do sizing well with external help.