We performed a comparison between Check Point CloudGuard Network Security and Cisco Secure Firewall based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Features: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security provides useful features including VPN Blade, IPS Blade, URL filtering, and Applications Control Blade. Cisco Secure Firewall offers features such as threat defense, dashboard visibility, and application visibility and control.
For the Check Point CloudGuard Network Security, users suggest enhancing their support system, adding features like cluster creation on AWS and a managed web portal. They also recommend providing more visibility on data protection and improving documentation and support services. As for Cisco Secure Firewall, improvements are needed in network performance, policy administration, customization options, web filtering, user-friendly management interface, performance for IPS, and functionality in public clouds.
Service and Support: While some customers have praised the technical support of Check Point, others have faced response delays. Cisco Secure Firewall's customer service has garnered mixed review. Some customers appreciate the immediate solutions provided by their technical support, while others have mentioned delays and difficulties, particularly with Firepower.
Ease of Deployment: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is generally considered easy and user-friendly for setup. However, it can be complex for some users and may require technical expertise. The deployment time varies depending on the number of customers or websites. Cisco Secure Firewall's initial setup reviews are mixed. Some find it difficult, while others find it straightforward. Cisco offers resources and documentation for assistance, yet the complexity can vary depending on the user's experience.
Pricing: The cost of setting up Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is perceived as high by most. There are, however, flexible pricing options with various discount models. Opinions on the pricing of Cisco Secure Firewall differ, with some finding it expensive and others considering it moderate.
ROI: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security consistently delivers a strong ROI of 80% to 85%, offering improved advantages and simplified administration. Cisco Secure Firewall exhibits fluctuating ROI, with some positive returns observed.
Comparison Results: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is the preferred choice when compared to Cisco Secure Firewall. Users find the initial setup of Check Point CloudGuard Network Security to be easy, straightforward, and user-friendly. Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is highly praised for its valuable features such as VPN Blade, IPS Blade, URL filtering, and Applications Control Blade.
"FortiGate has a strong security topic which allows all of the Fortinet devices to communicate and share information which makes their security more powerful."
"The most valuable feature is the ease of configuration."
"Its user interface is good, and it is always working fine."
"The most valuable features of the solution are SD-WAN, filtering testing applications, web filtering, and the new VPN."
"It's very fast and easy to configure."
"The solution has very good threat and content filtering switches."
"It is simple to manage, and there are a lot of functionalities in the same box."
"We are very happy with the general bandwidth agility we have seen from one website to another website."
"It's possible to sync the Check Point Management with the cloud portal, therefore allowing automated rules to be set in place whenever creating a new VM."
"The ease of administration with the cloud management extension and the cloud licensing model is valuable."
"Check Point is one of the few solutions that pay attention to cloud security. Many others mostly focus on providing on-premises solutions."
"The most valuable feature for me is that you have just one license. You can test and implement everything you need with one license. You do not need to pay for separate module licenses when you want IPS or other features."
"Check Point has pretty simple solutions, like the virtual appliance which you just download and it is imported into VMware and you just start using it."
"This solution brings us closer to having a better security score, which helps us a lot in complying with information regulations based on security."
"I find it really useful that CloudGuard supports all the main players on the Public Clouds market including AWS, GCP, and Azure, as well as some exotic ones like Alibaba Cloud, Oracle Cloud, and IBM Cloud."
"The tool's most valuable features for us are threat prevention, HTTPS inspection, and the Anti-Bot blade. Threat prevention helps to protect our assets from threats. HTTPS inspection ensures secure communication, and the Anti-Bot blade is particularly helpful in detecting C2 servers, enhancing our ability to identify malicious activities and protect our network."
"I have access to the web version of Cisco Talos to see the reputation of IP addresses. I find this very helpful. It provides important information for my company to obtain the reputation of IP addresses. The information in Talos is quite complete."
"The whole firewall functionality, including firewall policies and IPS policies, is valuable. It has all kinds of functionalities. It has IPS, VPN, and other features. They are doing quite a lot of stuff with their devices."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is AMP (Advanced Malware Protection), as this is really needed to protect against cyber threats."
"Cisco's technical support is the best and that's why everybody implements their products."
"This solution has good security, and it's a good product. You can trust Cisco, and there's support as well, which is really good."
"Cisco tech is always good and helpful. I would rate them as 10 out of 10."
"With the FMC and the FirePOWERs, the ability to quickly replace a piece of hardware without having to have a network outage is useful. Also, the ability to replace a piece of equipment and deploy the config that the previous piece of equipment had is pretty useful."
"I have experience with URL filtering, and it is very good for URL filtering. You can filter URLs based on the categories, and it does a good job. It can also do deep packet inspection."
"Fortinet FortiGate should improve the VPN tokens."
"Its reporting and pricing need improvement."
"The support structure needs to be improved because every time we contact them, there is a delay in the response."
"If they had better integration with security products, such as Cisco ISE or Rapid Threat Containment, then it would be an improvement."
"Some features of Fortinet FortiGate are actually fee enabled that are inconvenient for deploying in production. Other issues relate to isolation with Cisco products and your server."
"Currently, FortiGate is providing SSL VPN. But they're missing some features that are available in Palo Alto's SSL VPN."
"While FortiGate is cheaper than most other solutions, we're seeing increased license renewal costs. Most of our clients are asking for more significant discounts because the price is going up."
"The solution could be more secure and stable."
"Micro-Segmentation functionality for EAST-WEST traffic is not native and requires integration with a third-party OEM."
"The solution's integration with cloud providers has seen significant development in the past months, but there is room for improvement for better integration."
"The documentation has been rough. Being able to do it yourself can be hit or miss given the constraints of the documentation."
"We have the product deployed on Azure China. One crucial concern is the version limitation; unfortunately, in Azure China, we are restricted to running version R80. Our architecture has a Load Balancer, VMSS CloudGuard, etc. The duplication in this setup prevents the application from seeing the original client IP. This poses a problem for certain applications that require the original IP for login purposes. Although we managed a workaround with a different architecture involving a WAF, it is not as straightforward as the standard Azure setup."
"Check Point CloudGuard Network Security needs to improve the management of the actual firewalls. Improvement is also needed for the consolidated UI of different security aspects."
"Check Point CloudGuard Network Security should give productive reports as per business requirements. It needs to improve support since the time-limit extended beyond a day. It should include more seamless API integrations."
"While Check Point does offer some VWAN offerings, they appear to be more static and less tailored to cloud-native environments compared to Palo Alto's dynamic and flexible approach."
"The user experience might suffer if we don't have the time to follow up with our clients and ensure they are using the right options. Clients also want more local support in Portuguese and Spanish during their normal business hours. That's something I hear from my customers and my team, too."
"Also, they have a Firepower source file that I can work on the ASA device and on Firepower devices. A problem here lies in the way that you manage these devices. Some devices do not support the FMC, and some devices have to be managed through ASDM, and others have to be managed through FMC."
"On firewall features, Fortinet is better. Cisco needs to become more competitive and add more features or meet Fortinet's offering."
"I would like the ability to pick and choose different features of it to run in a packaged infrastructure or modules, therefore I would like to have more customizability over it."
"Cisco missed the mark with all the configuration steps. They are a pain and, when doing them, it looks as if we're using a very old technology — yet the technology itself is not old, it's very good. But the front-end configuration is very tough."
"We were also not too thrilled when Cisco announced that in the upcoming new-gen ASA, iOS was not going to be supported, or if you install them, they will not be able to be managed through the Sourcefire. However, it seems like Cisco is moving away from the ASA iOS to the Sourcefire FireSIGHT firmware for the ASA. We haven't had a chance to test it out."
"In the next release, I would like to see the VPN and UTM features included."
"Integration aspects and traffic shaping need improvement."
"10Gb interfaces should be available on more models."
More Check Point CloudGuard Network Security Pricing and Cost Advice →
Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is ranked 8th in Firewalls with 121 reviews while Cisco Secure Firewall is ranked 4th in Firewalls with 404 reviews. Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is rated 8.6, while Cisco Secure Firewall is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Check Point CloudGuard Network Security writes "Highly reliable, great visibility, and centralized management". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Cisco Secure Firewall writes "Highlights and helps us catch Zero-day vulnerabilities traveling across our network". Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is most compared with Azure Firewall, VMware NSX, Akamai Guardicore Segmentation, Fortinet FortiGate-VM and Palo Alto Networks VM-Series, whereas Cisco Secure Firewall is most compared with Palo Alto Networks WildFire, Netgate pfSense, Meraki MX, Sophos XG and Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls. See our Check Point CloudGuard Network Security vs. Cisco Secure Firewall report.
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