What are the pros and cons of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) vs Microsoft Azure Application Gateway for a large construction company?

Our organization ran comparison tests to determine whether Amazon’s Web Service Web Application Firewall or Microsoft Azure Application Gateway web application firewall software was the better fit for us. We decided to go with AWS WAF, which we found to be a highly scalable solution. In its cloud version, AWS WAF makes use of a concept known as auto-scaling. What this means is that users have the ability to scale the program up or down according to what their needs happen to be at the time. The software does this automatically, without requiring administrators to provide any outside input. This can save organizations a great deal in terms of time and resources. It is true that AWS WAF lacks the ability to integrate with some third-party products. However, even without this ability to integrate, its automated scaling makes it quite robust. Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is also quite scalable. That being said, it is not as effective in this regard as AWS WAF. The scaling provided by Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is not automatic. Administrators are required to manually scale up the product themselves if they want it to handle a larger load. This takes up time and resources that could be spent on other things. AWS WAF has a robust set of security features. Its firewall can protect against different types of cyber-attacks. It can repel both scripting and database-injection attacks. When it does so, it redirects the attack to a Fail2ban program, which marks the IP addresses where the attack originates as unsafe and bans them from the system. This can provide administrators with peace of mind. Microsoft Azure Application Gateway provides administrators with an effective way to protect their systems against attacks. However, it lacks security tools, such as the ability to block harmful IP addresses. As a result, there will be a greater expenditure of time dealing with all of the threats that the program has not simply blocked. Conclusion: While Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is a fairly competent product, we found AWS WAF to be a superior product. AWS WAF’s automated scaling and exceptional security package make it a more robust program.

We found Azure Front Door to be easily scaled and very stable. The implementation is very fast and Microsoft provides excellent support. Azure Front Door can quickly detect abnormalities before the traffic comes into the application. Azure Front Door is a very affordable global solution. It would be better, though, if the solution worked with multiple cloud defenders. Currently, it can only be used with the Azure cloud. The WAF feature with Azure Application Gateway is extremely valuable to us. It is a key feature we were looking for in a traffic load balancer. Azure Application Gateway integrates well with other solutions and we have found it to be excellent at catching attacks and stopping suspicious content. It is a regional solution that has no limitations in terms of scalability. We would like to see the monitoring improved, with better reporting capabilities. We would also like to see Azure Application Gateway allow for better filtering on traffic protocols; sometimes traffic that should have been allowed access has been cut off due to strict security presets. If we could see everything that was going on in the system, it would make the security center in Azure Application Gateway much better. Conclusion: These two solutions are similarly effective in the services and features they provide. They both offer great pricing and outstanding support. There are even some scenarios where Azure Application Gateway should be deployed behind Azure Front Door. The major difference is that Azure Front Door is a global service and Azure Application Gateway is a regional service, so they have very different capabilities. We were looking for a regional solution to satisfy our client and we found the added WAF feature of the Azure Application Gateway a much-desired feature for our team and our clients with specific regional needs. We also found that Azure Application Gateway integrated better with more solutions and met our client's needs more effectively.