AlgoSec Reviews

We primarily use the AlgoSec solution to monitor and interpret the risk status in our firewalls. Seeing the troublesome situations experienced in our firewalls from the same point of view sometimes does not help to solve the problem. However, thanks to AlgoSec, it is of great benefit to observe these risks from a different perspective and to see that they improve in the process. Being able to see and follow these changes makes the work of system administrators and risk analysts much easier.

It is of great benefit to observe the firewall risks from a different perspective and to see that they are improving in the process. When the effects of tightening and improvements are checked regularly, we can better monitor the current risk situation. It is a difficult process to examine the security risks in detail in each of our products and in our firewalls which may be different brands and models. AlgoSec enables us to manage this process in a central way.

AlgoSec can monitor the current status of firewalls. Other vendors mostly focus on working with daily tasks, however, AlgoSec is able to follow the live status and current issues or changes with the help of push technology. It can be easily integrated with different firewall devices (even different brands and models). In this way, it becomes very easy to monitor different risks from a single interface. Thanks to the web-based management screen, it can be easily managed through any end-user operating system.

At the integration point, a manual page could be added to the dashboard where directions about the products are explained in detail. In this way, if the system administrator wants to integrate a new product, they will be able to integrate this product by following these directions, even if they do not have deep knowledge of the product in question. Integrating different products should not require us to have to wait for coordinated work with a product specialist.

I've used the solution for almost four years.

In terms of stability, we have no complaints so far. We didn't face any problems.

This solution works well in mid-size companies. 

Customer service is very good and educated. However, the process to open a ticket sometimes could be harder than necessary since we need to collect some logs from the dashboard and upload them to the related ticket before submitting it.

I've used the Skybox Security solution as well.

The product offers an almost straightforward setup. It is easy to install and integrate.

I installed the product by myself.

We cannot calculate ROI based on vulnerability or data leak issues.

The cost and licensing are reasonable.

I did not evaluate other options.

As an administrator, I ensure the platform works as well as possible. We are responsible for everything on the platform, such as onboarding and offboarding devices and managing the information on there, access, etc. AlgoSec has a good security component, but we primarily use it as a network and firewall appliance. It communicates with firewall and router vendors and integrates well with major vendors, such as Palo Alto, Check Point, and Cisco. However, it has some limitations with other vendors. It depends on the brand, but all the vendors we use work well with AlgoSec. 

We use AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer, FireFlow, and AppViz. All of our AlgoSec devices are on-prem. We average about 15 users daily, at least. We divide AlgoSec users into requesters and actual users. Requesters have limited access to only FireFlow, where they can make a request. We have about 100 requesters and 20 direct users from the network, security, and other teams. 

AlgoSec made troubleshooting much more manageable. For example, we can quickly determine the cause of routing issues and do traffic simulations to discover if something is open. It helps us perform analysis faster. That's one of the significant advantages. 

AlgoSec simplifies the work of security engineers in two ways. First, it simplifies approvals. Every time a flow is requested, it goes to security for approval. The security team assesses the risk of each request and makes a decision based on that. Second, it made audits easier because analyzing firewalls and permitted traffic is effortless. All these little aspects don't seem like much, but they add up. We have lots of audits. The risk metrics help us to identify specific risks as long as we can define solid risk metrics. If that doesn't work, you can also use the API to gather much of that information.

FireFlow provides multiple ways to create tickets involving numerous teams. Our existing ticketing solutions are not as easily configurable. They have some more restrictions. AlgoSec is a significant improvement. It has considerably reduced the time we spend implementing firewall rules. For example, we had previously implemented some rules manually and others via FireFlow. We started to use FireFlow for all of them. Because even if the network review on FireFlow isn't as accurate, it's still a net reduction compared to the time it would take to implement everything manually. It's worth it to spend a little more time analyzing everything. We can select the firewall and let FireFlow take care of everything. It's not comparable because we can press a few buttons, and everything is done.

AlgoSec reduced human error and misconfigurations, especially in terms of firewall implementation. AlgoSec doesn't make many mistakes. Implementation errors are rare. For example, let's say that we are trying to analyze something. Creating things by hand requires us to look at a file with 25 lines. It's easy to forget something, but AlgoSec doesn't forget anything. 

AlgoSec provides us with all the information, and we have to check to see if it's working correctly. Of course, it's not perfect. Sometimes there's some routing missing. When it doesn't implement something, AlgoSec usually informs people it's not going to. 

My company is a massive enterprise with several DCs globally and various types of environments. In addition to those DCs, they also have several subsidiaries, so it's a giant network. We work on incorporating all these environments into a single pane of glass using AlgoSec. Previously, every DC had its own AlgoSec, but we're currently merging them all into a single global AlgoSec because it's best to have everything in one place managed by the same people. It will enable us to control and standardize everything. It's also better in terms of visibility. 

We have integrated AlgoSec with Cisco ACI, but I wouldn't say it adds much. ACI is replacing our previous architecture, which was also Cisco. It's mostly the same. The way AlgoSec collects information hasn't changed much. ACI is good at organization, but it doesn't add much to AlgoSec's security functions. AlgoSec comes in handy during cloud migration. 

When migrating to the cloud, we typically extract information from old servers and provide that to the migration technicians so they know what they need to open for the new server. If the migration goes well, we aren't usually too involved with it. Afterward, if they find issues, we can help detect them and understand why something is missing.

FireFlow is great. In a company that gets a large volume of requests to open firewall rules, it's helpful to have one place that summarizes the requests, enabling you to clearly understand why they need to be implemented and also implement them. Firewall Analyzer can help you identify missing routing or check information on the firewall without the need to log into a firewall or router to check the routing. We have all that access in three clicks.

AlgoSec provides excellent visibility. We can easily see our devices, how they're connected, and what information is on them. AlgoSec allows you to define your own risk metrics based on a set of rules. It gives you a report based on that, so it's highly customizable. 

A few features could be more customizable. For example, one of our issues is related to the comments. When using FireFlow and ActiveChange, the comments by AlgoSec can be changed, but they always have the FireFlow number first. That's mandatory. It can be a bit bothersome because that's sometimes not exactly what we want. The templates we use have some scripts running in the background that aren't easy to change or remake. 

These options could be improved. Some features take time to learn and understand. It would be hard to figure out without AlgoSec support. Every bug or every problem we encounter is challenging to understand and fix without them. We try to solve our own issues, but sometimes we can't, and we need AlgoSec support. 

I've been using AlgoSec for a year and a half.

I think the solution is pretty stable. There has rarely been an instance when we needed to reboot to fix something. It has happened, but it's uncommon. Overall, I would say it's highly stable.

The scalability is excellent. We are changing the architecture, including the remote agent. It has been easy to scale like this. 

I rate AlgoSec support a six out of ten. Our experience has been inconsistent. Sometimes, support is fast and clean; other times, not so much. Occasionally, they take a while to respond or provide an inadequate workaround instead of a solution. It also depends on the support we purchase because AlgoSec has different levels. The premium levels have 24-hour support. 

Neutral

I wasn't involved in the initial setup, but we had a migration in which we changed the server where it was hosted and changed the architecture a bit. It was pretty simple. We had the support of AlgoSec engineers, so it went smoothly and quickly. We have two platform administrators and a third person who is the product owner. He helps us a lot, especially with the bureaucracy and everything, but we can primarily manage the solution well with two people. 

We've seen a return on investment. We continue to use AlgoSec a bit more each day. We're not investing more in AlgoSec monetarily, but we're investing time into learning its features so we can use it to the fullest extent.

It comes down to the amount of work AlgoSec reduces. The volume of flow implemented monthly would be challenging to handle manually. It would take much longer to analyze and execute. Not counting security, one guy using FireFlow is enough to implement requests these days. One member of the network team and one person from security can implement all the requests within our SLAs. I'm unsure how many people we would need to do that manually. It would probably take five times as many people to do the same work. That's not even counting all the security and troubleshooting benefits AlgoSec provides. 

I know AlgoSec can be expensive. I've heard from some of the platform users who worked at other companies that wanted to use AlgoSec, but it wasn't within their budget. Large enterprises can use it if they have a huge network with several devices. It's worth the cost if they spend a lot of time auditing and dealing with security concerns. It pays off in the long run.

You must pay for the basic AlgoSec license and the number of devices onboarded. There are licenses per firewall and network device. I believe you also must pay extra for firewalls with ActiveChange. I don't know the precise figures because I don't work with them, but I think they change. 

I rate AlgoSec a nine out of ten. It makes life easier. Without AlgoSec, you need to deal with one or two layers of extra work, doing tasks manually and logging into devices to run commands. It simplifies a lot of daily work. I've grown accustomed to the ease of use, so it'll be hard to adapt if I get a new job at a place without it. 

The solution is excellent, but you need to customize it for your own purpose. Before I joined this company, the previous administrators worked closely with AlgoSec support to build the platform to their specifications. They were the ones that customized what we needed. After that, everything is straightforward. There are a few tweaks here and there, and everything is good to go. The biggest hurdle is getting started. It's good to work with support. If not, we'll constantly be dealing with modifications, bugs, errors, and stuff that doesn't work. Getting the platform right in the beginning makes it a lot easier.

We use Firewall Analyzer from AlgoSec. We are mainly using AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer for auditing and analyzing firewall configurations. We have added different vendors inside AlgoSec for analysis. We have added Palo Alto firewalls, Fortinet firewalls, and Cisco firewalls. We are using all of these in our network.

There's an option to collect logs and send them to AlgoSec, but we are not using this option. We have other solutions for this purpose. We have Darktrace, IBM QRadar, etc.

In terms of our network environment, for the on-prem network, we have different security zones. For the data center, we have different DMZs for internal applications. We have different networks in different locations connected to our corporate network. About 90% of our applications are on-prem, and we only have the websites on the cloud.

It's helpful for auditing firewall configuration. If there is any mistake on the configuration side, it helps us to fix it. If there is a complication or there are unused security policies, it suggests removing or double-checking them. It's a good product. It's stable and gives us accurate results.

We have a network with more than 10,000 users. We have a lot of security devices for finance, remote sites, and corporate. AlgoSec is helping us to review and do auditing of the security device configuration. It's helping us to audit and review the configuration for any mistakes for firewalls, web application firewalls, proxies, etc.

When we add a security device, such as a firewall, it analyzes the configuration files for the firewall and gives us a brief of everything, such as security policies, routings, and objects. It lets us know if there is any mistake in the configuration, which is helpful for us. It gives us good visibility of what we have inside our security devices. For example, one of the firewalls that we have has more than 500 security policies. With manual auditing, we cannot analyze or review such a huge configuration. So, we are using AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer for this purpose, and it has saved more than 70% of our time.

It reduces human errors and misconfigurations. It lets us know if there haven't been any traffic hits for a policy for a long time. We can then review the configuration to see why there are no new hits for this. We are reviewing all of this every six months. It makes our work easier. It simplifies the job of security engineers.

Being able to analyze the environment and audit firewall configuration is most valuable. We are working here in the oil sector, and it's a critical environment. Every six months we have auditors coming from the main office and doing auditing for security. We are using AlgoSec Analyzer to help us to do the audit before the auditors come to our office and do the auditing of our security devices. So, it's helping us to do good work and analyze all security devices, including firewalls.

My only concern is related to how they count the number of licenses. We have active and standby devices. If someone adds the standby device by mistake and does an analysis, it consumes two licenses. They need to improve the way they are counting the number of licenses because someone can do analysis on a standby device by mistake. We need a way to fix or solve this issue.

I noticed that some of the oil companies in Kuwait have started to use AlgoSec Analyzer. I see AlgoSec solutions in Kuwait. AlgoSec needs to have sales engineers here. They should have presales or sales consultants so that they can offer solutions to companies in Kuwait.

We have been using AlgoSec for more than four years.

It's a stable solution.

It's scalable. We have 10,000 users accessing services and the internet. We only have two users who are accessing and working with AlgoSec. They are security engineers.

They are cooperative. If we face any issues, we just send an email or open a case through the portal. We can contact them directly. We don't face any issues with their support. I would rate them a 10 out of 10.

Positive

I have not used other tools. We know AlgoSec is a leader in this industry. We haven't faced any issues in the last four years while using the AlgoSec solution. We haven't done any research on other solutions because we haven't faced any issues with AlgoSec.

It's very easy to do the initial setup. It's not a big issue. In about two days, you can configure your device, activate the license, and add security devices. If you have an admin account, you can allow AlgoSec Analyzer to access security devices. 

Its management is not a big issue. Only one person can maintain it.

We have seen an ROI. That's why we got this solution. We knew how we would use it and what would be its benefits. We have seen about 60% or 70% ROI.

We purchase licenses based on the number of security devices in our network.

When I have active and standby firewalls, if I do an analysis of the active firewall and by mistake, I also do an analysis of the secondary or standby firewall, it'll consume two licenses from the total number of licenses I have. So, I need to change the license and make the active firewall secondary. They need to improve how they are counting the number of licenses. We have discussed this with the consultation team of AlgoSec.

I would rate it a 9 out of 10. It's a good product. It's working fine without any issues. We don't face any issues. Our only concern is how they are counting the total number of licenses.

With AlgoSec, I hope to achieve network visibility, application connectivity, and so on, which is the way it was designed.

I am hoping AlgoSec will help solve specific problems by clearing and speeding up change management while providing needed network visibility and simplifying management.

AppViz stands out to me, and I think all of the features are interesting; AppViz is a really cool thing.

My experience with using the best features AlgoSec offers is minimal, but I am most excited to try AppViz.

Based on my initial impressions, I think there's room for improvement, but I haven't encountered anything that stood out as confusing or challenging.

I have not been using AlgoSec for very long.

My experience with customer support has been perfect.

I would rate the customer support a 10.

Positive

I previously used Skybox before considering AlgoSec, but I decided to switch because Skybox ended.

I evaluated other options before choosing AlgoSec, but I don't know the names of them.

My advice for others looking into using AlgoSec is that it's great, so do it.

I choose to rate AlgoSec 10 out of 10 because it is the best solution for our use case.

I was indeed offered a gift card or incentive for this review.

I have no additional thoughts about AlgoSec before we wrap up.

We have four firewalls and two routers in our environment. We also have a business application. At first, it was very difficult to connect to each firewall individually, see my environment as a whole, and determine where traffic was being blocked and who made changes. AlgoSec provides a solution to all of this in a single platform.

Being able to see where traffic is blocked using traffic simulation provides me with great convenience. Additionally, with FireFlow, I can handle this in a single action instead of taking actions on each firewall individually.

Thanks to Algosec, especially with the FireFlow and AppViz modules, I have managed the regulation compliance I need to adhere to through baseline compliance and checked my compliance with it. Without connecting to my firewalls one by one, I was able to handle all my changes with FireFlow in a single-handed manner according to a specific plan. I was able to clearly see the accesses to the application in my environment and the vulnerabilities of the application. The reports section was very useful in tightening up my policies.

Country-specific regulations should be added when required. Doing this on my own with baseline compliance is quite difficult.

Additionally, I would like AlgoSec to provide suggestions such as "this object includes that object" for my objects on the Check Point firewall. For my Fortigate manager, the support of the active change feature is important to me. 

Lastly, the FireFlow interface could be simplified a bit more. I agree that it is user-friendly, but on the other hand, it can be difficult to organize and find certain things.

I have been using AlgoSec for one year. 

We haven't encountered any interruptions while the product is running. It operates very stably.

We can add devices very quickly whenever we need to, with additional licenses.

I received sufficient and useful responses within a maximum of one day.

Positive

Straightforward. We imported the ova file and that's all, then just clicked add devices.

It has been a very useful and suitable investment for us.

The setup is very easy, and while I can't say anything definitive about the pricing in terms of competition, licensing is also quite straightforward.

We have tried Tuffin.

Our primary use of AlgoSec is to ensure the smooth operation of our network infrastructure. 

We are responsible for device onboarding and offboarding, managing access, and overseeing information security. While AlgoSec offers robust security features, we primarily utilize it for network and firewall management. 

It integrates seamlessly with major vendors like Palo Alto, Check Point, and Cisco, although there may be some limitations with other brands. We employ AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer, FireFlow, and AppViz, all of which are deployed on-premises. On average, we have around 15 daily users, including requesters and direct users from various teams.

AlgoSec has significantly enhanced our troubleshooting capabilities. We can quickly pinpoint the causes of routing issues and conduct traffic simulations to identify potential problems. This has streamlined our analysis processes, which is a major advantage.

Moreover, AlgoSec simplifies the work of our security engineers in two key ways. First, it streamlines the approval process for flow requests, with the security team assessing risk and granting approvals. Second, it facilitates audits by providing effortless access to firewall configurations and permitted traffic data, making compliance checks much smoother.

FireFlow, a component of AlgoSec, has been particularly valuable for us. It serves as a centralized platform for managing firewall rule requests, making it easy to understand and implement these requests efficiently. Additionally, Firewall Analyzer helps us identify missing routing information and check firewall status without the need to access individual devices.

AlgoSec has significantly reduced human errors and misconfigurations, especially during firewall implementation. It provides comprehensive information, minimizing the chances of oversight or omission. While it's not flawless, it typically alerts us when something cannot be implemented, ensuring transparency.

The standout features of AlgoSec include FireFlow, which simplifies firewall rule management, and Firewall Analyzer, which enhances visibility by identifying missing routing and firewall data. AlgoSec's flexibility in defining custom risk metrics and generating reports based on them has been highly beneficial.

AlgoSec's scalability has been excellent for our needs. We've made architectural changes, including incorporating remote agents, and scaling up has been straightforward. The integration with Cisco ACI has been somewhat seamless, although it hasn't added significant functionality to AlgoSec's security features.

We've also found AlgoSec invaluable during cloud migrations. It aids in extracting information from old servers to guide migration technicians on what needs to be opened for new servers.

While AlgoSec offers many advantages, there are some areas for improvement. Certain features, like comments in FireFlow, could be made more customizable. Additionally, some features require a learning curve and may necessitate support from AlgoSec, which can be challenging at times.

While AlgoSec offers many advantages, there are some areas for improvement. Certain features, like comments in FireFlow, could be made more customizable. Additionally, some features require a learning curve and may necessitate support from AlgoSec, which can be challenging at times.

I've used the solution for one year.

We didn't use a different solution.

We did not evaluate other options. 

I started working with AlgoSec to integrate change opening tools with some clients as I work at an AlgoSec reseller.

I have customized hooks so that custom actions could be triggered within AlgoSec, before implementing the active change I worked to generate scripts to clean up the checkpoint firewall rule base based on AlgoSec reports. My experiences with AlgoSec have always been with end-user support, especially when it comes to software development. That said, I've also done an installation and helped the customer create the approval flow.

AlgoSec has been a partner in my company for many years, with which we can improve our customers' experience.

It adds many facilities in the management of network equipment, due to the ease in analyzing the rule base. It helps firewalls to have a better performance since the rules are positioned more efficiently and unnecessary rules and objects are removed.

The training provided by AlgoSec helps a lot in the development of employees who work with the tool.

I recently discovered the "ask the community" option and it made problem-solving a lot easier.

All of AlgoSec's features are very good, however, in my point of view traffic planning and risk analysis are the most important, with them we can have a view of which items will be affected by the change, which objects need to be created or used, which rules will be affected, with that we can have a much more optimized base and easier to maintain.

With the risk analysis, we can customize it according to the company because each client may have a different risk scenario.

The possibility of customization also makes the job much easier.

Plugins for integration with other tools as ServiceNow, for example, would be ideal. This would facilitate the work without needing a developer to carry out integrations, mainly for market tools.

We need a screen to view system logs. This would facilitate the problem analysis process. The possibility of placing buttons in another system to trigger actions within AlgoSec would be great. For example, placing an HTML button in ServiceNow that triggers the active change. Being able to view the ticket flow within other tools would be useful.

I've used the solution for three years.

I've always worked with the standalone version.

I've always used Algosec.

I have not looked into ROI.

The costs are paid according to use.

I did not evaluate other options previously.

We work on the support side, and our customers use AlgoSec, primarily via on-prem deployments. They use the solution to analyze and engage firewall policies, increase their security, and receive advice for firewall optimization. 

The solution component we use is AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer. We have a customer who uses FireFlow, and we carried out a POC of AppViz, which some of our customers may want to implement in the next year.  

AlgoSec reduced the time it takes to implement firewall rules for our organization. 

The product helps us prepare for audits and ensure firewalls are in compliance; we can check the security and firewall rating points and advise our customers on optimizing their firewall and security rules. 

AlgoSec helped simplify the job of our security engineers, primarily through the advice it provides to admins managing the firewalls, which is essential. It also made them more efficient at their jobs.   

The Firewall Analyzer component has excellent compatibility with the solution, and it's highly useful and easy to manage.

Our customers find the Intelligent Policy Tuner very helpful, and it was useful for us during the POC because it was a significant selling point for our clients; they liked it and wanted to use it.

The solution provides excellent visibility into our network security policies, especially when we set the log options to ''extensive''; this gives us a lot of visibility for reports and change notifications. 

AlgoSec provides complete visibility into the risk involved in firewall change requests, which is especially important when presenting security reports to upper management.  

The solution's automation helped to reduce human error and misconfigurations; if the tool detects a drop in security and firewall policy points, it notifies admins via email of a potential misconfiguration, allowing us to fix the issue and raise the points again.  

More scope for editing alerts would be a welcome change. 

The solution has visibility and compatibility issues with Palo Alto firewalls, which makes it challenging to provide reports. The reports rely on logging, and the product has problems with Palo Alto's logging. Better compatibility with Palo Alto firewall reports is a must.

Some of our customers want to see AlgoSec with a user-based policy that can advise on user policy rules and be compatible with identity awareness.

I've been using the solution for over eight years across two companies.

The stability is good; there's no problem with it. 

The customer service is responsive and reliable enough, and most of our cases are solved within a day or two.

Positive

The setup is very straightforward; we use VMs, so our customers don't need appliances. We can set up a VM and install AlgoSec in 15-30 minutes, then further configuration such as DNS, names, IP addresses, and adding the firewalls takes two to three hours.

The upgrade process is also straightforward; when the upgrade package is released, we download it, import it to a machine, and implement it with one SSH command. The solution doesn't require any further maintenance. 

I'm not involved in the financial aspect, but I understand the platform to be expensive, though I need to find out how it compares to competitors like Tufin, for example.

I rate the solution a nine out of ten. 

Some of our customers work with different security vendors, including FortiGate, Palo Alto, and Check Point, and integration with their firewalls is straightforward when using AlgoSec.  

We are also a supporter of Tufin in Turkey, and there are some advantages to using AlgoSec, as it's more useful in specific ways. With the latter, it's quick and easy to get reports, and AlgoSec has lower spec requirements for new installs. It requires a maximum of 16-32 GB of memory and 500 GB to one TB of storage, but Tufin requires 60 GB of memory and one to two TB of storage. AlgoSec is more straightforward and user-friendly; the options are named clearly, so it's easy to add identities or active directories.

The product is suitable for small, medium, and large businesses; they could all find a use for it. 

I recommend the solution; I've been using it for eight years, and it's more user-friendly and useful than other products.

The company has a lot of sites that are involved in food production and has locations with on-premises firewalls and a data center. There is a cloud in Asia as well.

Right now, AlgoSec is being used to optimize the firewall and the firewall policies, and to clean up any unused rules or those that are too open.

We have 10 to 15 users.

I like that the firewall will analyze the tools within the risk profiles and the policy optimizations within the AFA. This can also be used to create reports for the customer with the risk profiles to optimize the firewall rules.

I think it's a powerful tool that gives good visibility. One of AlgoSec's nice features is the map of your entire environment. When you need to change something, you can see the whole path for the traffic, that is, where you need to implement the change, where the traffic is blocked, and where it's allowed.

AlgoSec provides full visibility into the risks involved in firewall change requests. This is important because when your environment grows to a certain scale, it becomes harder and harder to get the full overview of all your firewalls and rule sets.

AlgoSec can reduce the time it takes to implement firewall rules. I tried the FireFlow module in a course with AlgoSec. With active implementation, it smooths out the process so much more. If you have two or three firewalls that you need to implement, AlgoSec does everything for you. It reduces the time in terms of both looking through your environment to see where you would need the firewall rules and implementing them as well.

If you're just looking at your firewalls, you might not notice all the security risks and open rules. AlgoSec's automation helped to reduce human error and misconfigurations. It helps with cleanup and keeps your firewall as tight as possible. It helped to simplify the job of our security engineers.

Our organization works in multiple environments, and the firewalls are located across the globe. This solution enables us to manage these multiple or dispersed environments in a single pane of glass.

I'm responsible for the maintenance of the server, that is, patching and upgrading, and it's straightforward. It cleans itself up with the retention and everything you configure on it. 

All our firewalls were renamed, and AlgoSec saw these devices as new devices. As a result, all the reports from the same device but with the old hostname were no longer connected. AlgoSec did not clean up the old reports as well. After a few days, it depleted its own storage, and then, the server became inaccessible. 

There's no fail-safe for AlgoSec to not stop creating reports if its own storage is at 98% or 99% capacity because the server becomes inaccessible when it reaches 100%.

I've also been fighting an issue with the Chisel service running on the server regarding AlgoCare for some time now. I have been in contact with AlgoSec's technical support regarding this, and they've been helpful and responsive.

I've been using AlgoSec for six months, but the organization has been using it for some time.

When it doesn't fill its own storage and kills itself, the stability is fine. It has only happened one time; the ms-metro service went down, so the web GUI became inaccessible. All in all, though, the stability is good.

AlgoSec's technical support is swift, knowledgeable, and professional. We had some issues when we upgraded from A32.10 to A32.20, and they helped us to get it up and running again. All the contact I've had with them has been very positive, and I'd give them a ten out of ten.

Positive

Consider whether your infrastructure needs this solution. The organization should be a specific size before this product will come in handy for you. If you are a large enterprise with a lot of sites and a large infrastructure, then you should certainly consider using AlgoSec. I've loved working with it and would rate it a ten on a scale from one to ten.

Our primary purpose right now is Firewall AlgoSec Analyzer so we can ensure that our rules are nice and tight. We also use the configuration report to make sure that the firewall configuration is nice and tight. 

We are starting to use modeling. AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer enables us to input details about what we would like to do to see what firewall changes would be required, if any. Also, if we are having problems with getting an application running across the network, then we can use that to establish what firewall rules might be giving us problems.

As a small branch office focused on wholesale banking, we have a very flat network that we are trying to improve upon. Over the course of last year, everything has been flat and accessible. Now, we are breaking into VLAN segmentation. That is where Firewall Analyzer will really come into good use, because it will help us to limit the traffic to only what is necessary. 

We have some cloud. Our core banking is with a different organization, which is in the cloud. We also have a couple of other treasury cloud applications in the cloud. However, a fair amount of our network is within our data center and office. So, we have a hybrid model.

We are very simple. The benefit of AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer right now is to give us skills that we don't already have with our people. Also, when we get into our periodic reviews, AlgoSec enables us to do it without adding additional staff. Something that we are not able to do because that is controlled in the Chilean head office. So, we need to make the best use of the best tools to secure our environment with a minimal number of people.

AlgoSec reduced the time it takes to implement firewall rules in our organization. Before, our firewall rule review was always done manually. When we installed the appliance and ran the report, we quickly found half a dozen areas where we were more exposed than we needed to be. The manual process used to go on for weeks. The AlgoSec process right now, as we develop and become better with it, takes only a matter of two or three days. We can have a good solid review, then we can get into very specific details about any rule or configuration with the objective of ensuring least privilege. Only the things that are needed to support business activities are allowed.

We are a regulated industry: financial services. We are obliged to at least annually review our firewall rules for risk. Are they too permissive? Are they not needed? Because we have this tool, we can now do that once a quarter. Before, we only did it once a year. 

We are a small branch of a much larger organization in Latin America. The rules that were set up allow free flow of information back and forth, i.e., network connections. Right now, with ransomware being what it is, we are starting to review those rules because they are too permissive. Another way that AlgoSec is helping us, internally, is working with our head office to make sure that they are treated with least privilege. Something that is not normal. Something that didn't happen, "Just because."

I have been with this organization for about two years. All the wide-openness of the network communications was just a bad event waiting to happen. AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer has given us the great ability to dig down into the details and work at a level above the skills that we already have, making sure that we are in a process. It started months ago and will continue for seven more months. That network traffic in and out of our perimeter is the least that it should be.

We work with multiple security vendors. For just IT alone, we have three primary vendors and a couple others that pitch in when needed. AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer helps us to make sure that we allow only what they need and that we keep them to the internal assets. They are external third-parties. We have high assurance that they are only able to access network assets that are part of the contract. Another vendor manages our firewall. The reason we have them do it is because we don't have the expertise amongst our people. So, the addition of the AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer enables us to have the intelligence of what is good and what is less than good. Thus, we can help keep that third-party on the rails, that they are doing good things for us, and we have the evidence to prove it.

We are getting into using AlgoSec to implement and manage micro-segmentation initiatives. One of our audit concerns was the flat network, and we started to work based on what we already know to create a test segment. However, AlgoSec is helping us to validate the traffic that will be allowed into that new segment, restricted to only that which we need. No sense in creating an isolated network if bad things can still flow back and forth between test and production. So, AlgoSec is a tool that is helping us make sure that we have all the isolation that we need. But, because of the syslog counters, we can also tell over time whether we did a good job in the first place and whether the remaining rules that we configured to be nice and tight are still needed for business purposes.

The most valuable is helping us determine where our rules are too permissive. Based on previous human review of our rules, they are very cursory. We know why we do something, but we don't get into the details of whether the rule is nice and tight. What Firewall Analyzer lets us do is understand the risks presented by our rules. The tool does a calculation of all the traffic that could be allowed and we can match that to whether it should be allowed. Another thing that we have recently started to do, but only about 100 days ago, is collect syslog events from the firewall that now tell us whether the rules that might be well-configured are actually being used by people or traffic. Our next step will be to start eliminating well-formed rules that just aren't needed.

The overall visibility that AlgoSec gives me into our network security policies is perfect. We think about separation of duties. As the information security officer, I shouldn't be logging into the firewall and playing around. What AlgoSec does is give me the ability to see everything about the firewall: its rules, configurations, and usage patterns. It gives me all the visibility that I need to make sure that we are doing what we should do to keep it tight. There is no perimeter anymore. We have to be very careful what we are letting in and out, and Firewall Analyzer helps us to do that.

Another very useful feature of the AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer is it will alert us to changes in firewall rules and configuration. So, we have a third-party who manages our firewall. AlgoSec gives us notification, if they go in and make changes either to the configuration or rules, so we can keep track and make sure that only authorized changes are occurring.

We are using AlgoSec directly against our Cisco Firepower. At first, AlgoSec didn't work with Firepower. It didn't know how to read the logs. So, improvement has been made. Now, the feature that was available on the older generation firewall is available on the current one, but this is a problem which has already been dealt with.

I became familiar with AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer way back in 2004. I was trying to do some independent consulting, and part of that is a good firewall review. So, I started to look for tools. That is when I had my first discussion with AlgoSec. Since then, I have used it a couple at different organizations, including the one where I work now. It has been quite helpful with making sure that our firewall configuration is all that it should be.

It is set and forget. I don't have a lot of Linux or Unix experience, at least not in the last 20 years. So, that has been removed from me. The appliance comes and we connect to the command line. Anything I need to do is menu-driven. So, it is easily maintained by people whose skill set changed from hands-on to management quite awhile ago.

Scalability is not something that I have had to concern myself with right now.

Currently, we have five people who use it to either tune the rules or find out answers to questions about the network and flows.

We have a customer success manager, Matt, who is terrific, very responsive, and always there for us when we need it, providing quick answers. This also applies to the support desk if we raise a ticket. I did have a problem after we installed the A32 version, where I was getting some errors in the email. The engineers got into the code and found some code that needed to be corrected. I don't remember exactly what the problem was, but it took less than two hours to find and correct it. So, the support has been superb.

At this bank, it replaced the manual solution, where if you were not a Tier 3 Network Engineer, then you were probably not going to be able to get into the details and nuances of any of the rules and configurations. So, they get glossed over. The firewall review done manually is more of a sanity check. "Do we need the rule at all?" is really the question that gets asked, not whether the rule is done correctly to support privilege and least access.

The setup was quite easy. 

if I were to take out the fits and starts that were our responsibility, the installation was less than four hours. Then, the upgrade was done because we went from version A30 to A32. That took about an hour and a half. It was very simple and straightforward. Now, when I need to do regular releases, i.e., patches, I can do them myself. It is menu-driven. It's pretty easy.

AlgoSec's support was there for us. We worked with them. They did all the heavy-lifting. It was easy to schedule as well as very flexible, as we got our act together. Organization is important. 

One staff member would have been sufficient for deployment and upgrades, but I made sure that our IT staff population representation was there so they understood the tool, where it was going, and how it would be used. However, it easily could have been done with only one person on our end.

In the end, I did a calculation. When I think about the number of people, when we did the manual way, who had to be involved, and how long did it go? Did we risk being out of compliance with regulations? There is a big cost to that. It is cheaper operationally to work with AlgoSec than to try to do this manually.

AlgoSec has absolutely helped to simplify the job of our security engineers. It gives us a level of expertise that we didn't have within our own staff. AlgoSec showed us that what our staff could do wasn't good enough. So, it is a force multiplier. It enables us to have the expertise that we don't have, but it also gives us the cycles, e.g., the actual ability to extract the rules, evaluate them, and then assemble them into a form that we can present to auditors and regulators, if needed. This greatly helps us. As a tool that has so many features, there are certainly more that we can grow into, but the ones that we are using right now have been of a substantial value to us. This is even being commented by our auditors from one review period into another.

The staff enjoy it. There is always that dynamic between security and IT. IT has projects to do and serve the business. Security isn't quite seen in that same light. So, they enjoy it because they don't have to spend the time to go through the rules, trying to reverse-engineer what is going on, and it takes care of a lot of the documentation for them. It keeps them in the zone that they are used to working with the correspondence that belongs to the rule, allowing them to understand the details. This has helped us understand ourselves better, how we operate on the network layer, and saved us the time of actually doing the rules. So, we are much better with our compliance, audits, and regulatory requirements, but we are also better in our security. Two things that an ISO always has to be concerned with - compliance and actual security. This tool acts like another person on staff, increasing our ability to be very fine-tuned on rules. We will be using it for a while to come.

I am a fan of AlgoSec for its pricing. As a small branch, getting any amount of money, is very difficult. Less than a thousand dollars, that will take some effort for two reasons:

1. Asking for money.
2. It wasn't in the budget. 

The price came in where we really didn't even need to have much of a discussion. That was very good. There are also options regarding what you want to pay for. It wasn't really pushed on me that I have to get all of it or else I can't be an AlgoSec customer. 

There are training and support levels that come in beyond the product itself, and we did subscribe to the training. We also have the support. The pricing has been very approachable, and that is why we have it here.

I have looked at other options along the way, like Skybox. AlgoSec came to the market before the alternatives did. When I become aware of it and something is good, I stick with it. Why change? 

I went to the Gartner page and looked at who the competitors were. I looked at customer reviews and things like that. However, because I have had such a good experience with AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer, I continue to use it. I have found no reason to go with any of the other alternatives.

Our local policy is that I have to be able to compare at least three products when I go to management to ask for money. I did exactly that. I took three alternatives and brought them to our management team. I explained the whys and wherefores for why I was promoting AlgoSec. Now, we have it here in our environment.

I would recommend, "Do it," in regards to implementing AlgoSec. I wouldn't have been with it since 2004 if it wasn't among the best tools. I have tools in vulnerability scanning and SIEM/SOC as well as tools for authentication. There are a lot of tools. As a security guy, I have been doing this since 1997. When you find a product that delivers, you stick with it, and AlgoSec is that type of product.

I have been so pleased with the tool. It sounds cliché, but I haven't gotten to a point yet where the tool hasn't provided for me. This is why I always come back to it. For an organization as small as ours, it gives us a tool that is affordable, easy to implement, and the expertise that we were lacking.

When I need it, it is there. If I have a question about an endpoint or protocol, I am trying to resolve audit points about what ports are listening and why, or I have to figure out how to isolate something more than it already is, AlgoSec is the tool that I go to first to get information and answer some of these questions. In most cases, all the details and rules are all right there. It has been great.

I have seen the capability for AlgoSec to enable us to manage multiple or dispersed environments in a single pane of glass. Because I am such a supporter and have seen the value that AlgoSec can bring to more than one organization, I invited the CSO office in Chile to attend a work session with us so they can start to see everything that AlgoSec might do for them. I knew that it was on their task list, and they have a need to get into the same area. The potential is there that our head office will begin to use the tool, having seen how it has been helping us in just our local office. They need it more because they do have a broader array of firewalls, connections, and things like that. So, I'm looking forward to that.

I know for a fact we are not getting all the value out of the appliance that we can. I know for a fact we are getting more value out of the appliance than we intended when we licensed it. Those are good things. The visualization of our network is helping me. There are diagrams that can be drilled into which help me. When you are small, going over to IT all the time and asking questions isn't always the best thing. It is disruptive. Then, I have to worry whether I got the right answer or not. AlgoSec removes those things. I see what is happening and I know that it is based on the facts. There are five of us using it. I am sure that we use it every week, probably not every day to answer questions, and we are running monthly reports, which are automated, so we have a good history. So, we have the opportunity at any point to identify problems and resolve them.

What we have learned from using AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer: We didn't understand our risk with our firewall. It is good that we relied on a credible third-party, but what we saw was rules could be better configured. These are our protection to the outside world between the bad world outside and inside, between our head office and us. I worked for a Wall Street firm, and we didn't trust anybody. It is a big deal now with zero trust. This tool will help us to get there, dialing things down.

For the AlgoSec experience (the company, product, support, and people), I want to give it 10 (out of 10). Nobody trusts that, but they have been very good to me. The boss who didn't like spending money is very happy with the results. I brought it back to him and showed him what we have been able to do past our manual efforts, and it resonates with him. It makes sense to him. He reads the paper. He sees how quickly ransomware can spread across a network. One of the things that we can do to help protect against that is make sure that we have good segmentation and only the endpoints which really need to talk to each other are allowed to do so.