We compared Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps and Netskope CASB based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Microsoft Defender is the preferred option over Netskope due to its integration with other Microsoft tools, user-friendly interface, and affordability for smaller businesses. Netskope has a large client base and impressive features like cloud app authorization and regulatory classification, but lacks integration and has reporting and support limitations. Microsoft Defender offers superior threat protection and coordination for detecting and responding to threats.
"On the outside, the main differentiation is because Lookout ingest. They have ingested basically all of the apps for the last ten years and all the versions of all the apps, and we have that in a corporate database that allows us to do very large-scale machine learning and analysis on that data set. That's not something that any of the competitors really have the capability to do because they don't have access to the data set. A lot of the apps you can no longer get them because that version of the app is five or six years old, and it just doesn't exist anywhere anymore, except within our infrastructure. So, the ability to have that very rich dataset and learn from that dataset is a real differentiator."
"The solution is stable."
"The protection offered by the product is the most valuable feature. It detects vulnerabilities or traps on our users' phones and then prompts them to clean up their devices. Tools we used previously would only discover, which required us to gather information on the backend, so Lookout is a welcome upgrade."
"The most valuable features are the antivirus as a whole, the anti-malware, and all of the protection features that scan our enterprise devices."
"The ability to prevent users from using certain applications is one of the most valuable features. It doesn't require any configuration for implementation from the client perspective. It just works right away and gives you the information you need."
"Defender's integration with our identity solutions is critical in our current setup."
"The most valuable feature is its policy implementation."
"If your business requirements are relatively simple, it can get the job done."
"It is very easy to use, which is what we look for in these types of solutions."
"The most valuable feature is the seamless integration across different clouds."
"The product helps us with privileged identity management to control who has access to what and for how long."
"The product’s most valuable feature is SQL database."
"In Azure, we have multiple subscriptions and with every subscription, we add some kind of instance ID. We can work with the instance ID so that we allow all of the instances containing nodules. Everything else, we block. This way, if you go to outlook.com and check your email, if you log in with your company account, the instance ID will show. The network will take action according to the instance ID and say, "You are using the enterprise email. I'll let you surf. I'll let you see your email." But when you try to log in with your own email address, like Hotmail or Gmail, the instance ID will be different. This way we are not completely blocking Outlook, but we are blocking people from accessing their Outlook. We are only allowing the enterprise-level emails, and we are not allowing user-based emails."
"It has hundreds of features and many of them are useful."
"Amazing reporting and tracking mechanisms."
"It is a very scalable tool."
"Netskope is a really good product. I cannot segregate which features are the most valuable. We find most of the features to be valuable. It gives us what we are looking for."
"Technical support is good. They are very helpful and quick to resolve any issues we have."
"It's a comprehensive security portfolio solution."
"The automation offered by the product is pretty solid."
"We just submitted an enhancement request reflecting the main area we want to see improvement in; the APIs. Currently, we're able to build dashboards, but it's somewhat backward because we use our MDM API to create them. Lookout should provide API to customers so we can query our data and use it in our cloud, and this is the only outstanding area for improvement with the product right now."
"The stability depends on the service from where you access it. Because sometimes, the place you are in, you have Gateway. You don't have Gateway. The gateway is overutilized. At the end, you need to go through their gateways. And this is the key point here. You have a tracking point. If it's not well orchestrated, and it scales up as you add more to the existing team, you will suffer"
"Lookout was moving into the SSE space. And so their work on SecureWeb Gateway and SD-WAN is still sort of evolving."
"From the analysis that we've done, they do seem to be maybe a step behind in trying to enter the market with a new solution. But when they do pick up, they do come out with some good products."
"It doesn't actually decrease the time to respond. This has been an issue with Microsoft recently. Sometimes, there is a delay when it comes to getting an alert policy email... Sometimes it takes two or three hours for that email to be sent."
"Defender for Cloud apps is primarily useful for Azure apps. It has limited capabilities for applications based on other cloud platforms."
"Sometimes the support is actually lacking."
"We would like to get more information from the endpoint. I don't get enough detailed information right now on why something failed. There is not enough visibility."
"It takes some time to scan and apply the policies when there is some sensitive information. After it applies the policies, it works, but there is a delay. This is something for which we are working with Microsoft."
"There are challenges with detection and there are challenges with false-positive rates."
"I would like to see them include more features in the older licenses. There are some features that are not available, such as preventing or analyzing cloud attacks."
"Defender could integrate better with multi-cloud and hybrid environments. It requires some additional configuration to ingest data from non-Azure environments and integrate it with Sentinel."
"The CSPM model needs to improve."
"They could add endpoint security features."
"Deployment and policy tweaking were two areas where improvement needs to be made."
"I deduced two points: one for their feature modification and one for the feature maturity of the solution."
"If we need to allow a process that is blocked by Netskope, we have to manually check the logs to see why it is blocked. This can be time-consuming and inefficient"
"Technical support and the user interface could be improved."
"Support services could definitely be improved. Support is the one area that can always use improvement. It's an evolving thing, so based on demand and based on market requirement and the way market is moving towards."
"The solution is still pretty new to the CASB environment."
More Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps Pricing and Cost Advice →
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is ranked 2nd in Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) with 30 reviews while Netskope is ranked 4th in Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) with 35 reviews. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is rated 8.4, while Netskope is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps writes "Integrates well and helps us in protecting sensitive information, but takes time to scan and apply the policies and cannot detect everything we need". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Netskope writes "Network proxy that provides visibility during deployment and allows you to control PII". Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is most compared with Zscaler Internet Access, Cisco Umbrella, Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks, Qualys VMDR and Microsoft Defender for Identity, whereas Netskope is most compared with Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks, Zscaler Internet Access, Cisco Umbrella, Skyhigh Security and Forcepoint ONE. See our Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps vs. Netskope report.
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We monitor all Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.