AlgoSec vs Cisco Defense Orchestrator comparison

AlgoSec and Cisco are both solutions in the Firewall Security Management category. AlgoSec is ranked #1 with an average rating of 9.0, while Cisco is ranked #14. AlgoSec holds a 22.1% mindshare in Firewall Security Management, compared to Cisco’s 1.1% mindshare. Additionally, 96% of AlgoSec users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Cisco users who would recommend it.

AlgoSec

Read 182 AlgoSec reviews

10,264 Views
4,443 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

Cisco Defense Orchestrator

Read 15 Cisco Defense Orchestrator reviews

725 Views
245 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

AlgoSec

Cisco Defense Orchestrator

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 4, 2024

AlgoSec and Cisco Defense Orchestrator compete in network security management, with Cisco Defense Orchestrator holding the upper hand due to its robust features and perceived value for the price.

Features: AlgoSec offers comprehensive policy analysis, risk management, and compliance assurance capabilities. Cisco Defense Orchestrator provides powerful automation, multi-vendor support, and streamlined policy change management, making it suitable for complex network environments with better integration and scalability.

Room for Improvement: AlgoSec could benefit from enhancements in automation and scalability to better serve large enterprises. Improving user interface and integration capabilities would also enhance its appeal. Cisco Defense Orchestrator could improve customer support response times, offer more flexible pricing options, and increase compatibility with various network components.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: AlgoSec features a flexible deployment model with strong customer support, ideal for smaller networks. Cisco Defense Orchestrator's cloud-based model simplifies deployment for large-scale operations but faces challenges with support response times.

Pricing and ROI: AlgoSec is recognized for its competitive setup cost and cost-effective policy management, delivering a good ROI. Cisco Defense Orchestrator may have higher initial costs but justifies them with significant ROI through enhanced security features and operational efficiencies, especially valuable for large enterprises.

To learn more, read our detailed AlgoSec vs. Cisco Defense Orchestrator Report (Updated: January 2025).

Buyer's Guide

AlgoSec vs. Cisco Defense Orchestrator

January 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

AlgoSec

Ranking in Firewall Security Management

1st

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

182

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Cisco Defense Orchestrator

Ranking in Firewall Security Management

14th

Average Rating

8.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Firewall Security Management category, the mindshare of AlgoSec is 22.1%, up from 20.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Defense Orchestrator is 1.1%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Firewall Security Management

Featured Reviews

Shameerudheen Kp

Manager, MS Operations at NTT Security

Easy to setup with good auto-implementation and good rule reviews

AlgoSec is slow when it is loaded with too many firewalls and policies. A plan to take care of heavy usage is to be considered. Support of all firewalls and policy features to be enabled. AlgoSec should support in identifying most hit rules and re-ordering existing firewall rules - this is a very key to manage firewall CPU. A clustering of AlgoSec can also be considered. A group of AlgoSec servers managing large client bases geographically or datacenter-wise or function-wise. A head reporting unit and child processing units.

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Vivek Balaji

Technical Director - Cyber Security at a comms service provider with 1-10 employees

Useful guides, excellent support, integration could improve

Cisco Defense Orchestrator has useful guides for the steps that need to follow by users Cisco Defense Orchestrator can improve by providing more support for third-party security components. I have been using Cisco Defense Orchestrator for approximately eight months. The Cisco Defense…

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

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

"The initial setup process is excellent."

"The automation of the firewall rule deployment, working together with our ticketing system, is the most valuable feature of this solution. The needs as required by a user request are automatically validated and configured in the specified firewalls without any human action."

"The visibility provided by the single pane of glass for managing multi-vendor firewalls is excellent and then pinpointing network connectivity issues is certainly on a very good level."

"AlgoSec is able to provide a consistent view into all of an organization's firewalls, regardless if the management is done by different companies."

"We need less time to identify any risks in our firewalls, as we can detect changes in real-time."

"The features that are most valuable are the interactive topology map and the traffic simulation queries."

"The solution is easy to navigate."

More AlgoSec pros

"With Cisco Defense Orchestrator, we can manage the complete Cisco Security solution. It provides a simple and centralized way to manage all products."

"The most valuable feature is that you can push one policy or one rule out to several devices at a time."

"The most valuable feature is the automation, as it reduces user intervention and allows us to focus on other tasks."

"The initial setup was straightforward. We spun up the VM onsite. We generated the key that it needed to talk to the Cloud Orchestrator. After that, as I started adding devices, it was relatively quick and easy."

"The ability to do operations on multiple firewalls at once is valuable because it saves time and mental effort. The solution's ability to make bulk changes makes it very convenient to manage things at once on multiple targets."

"The most valuable feature is the Intrusion prevention."

"We use a lot of image upgrades. We take some 20 devices and then we update everything at once, including the policies. We apply policies for groups. For certain groups, like anti-viruses, we send out policies and apply them to every single device. It's really easy and simple."

"If our server is blocked, this solution shows us why it is blocked and allows us to update the network routing."

More Cisco Defense Orchestrator pros

Cons

"They can make some improvements to the user interface because it can be slow at times."

"I would like an intelligent tuner where it could help update rules with the application ID."

"The pricing for smaller installations should be lowered because sometimes there is just no ROI to add AlgoSec to the small branch offices with only 10 rules."

"Automate the change documentation in MS Word format. Therefore, we can customize it, if needed."

"Due to the fact that AlgoSec's user interface is less friendly than that of other programs, it might not be appropriate for persons with little experience in security or IT."

"We faced internal challenges with our services and the process. If we had a closer approach from AlgoSec with instructions on how to build or change the management process, how to improve our environment, it would have been better. The big problem was more about the approval and request roles, and bureaucratic side of things."

"Fireflow needs to be a little more user-friendly."

"The simulation can be improved."

More AlgoSec cons

"It would be a better product if it incorporated device control for third-party products easily."

"They need to work on the user interface. It needs to be improved to make it more user-friendly."

"Cisco Defense Orchestrator should be made more user-friendly overall."

"They can centralize all products and provide a correlation about an incident and the response. They can also provide an on-premises solution. Currently, Cisco Defense Orchestrator is just for cloud deployments, not for on-premises deployments. Customers have to manage it on the cloud. We are based in Vietnam, and most of the customers here prefer to have on-premises deployments. Customers, especially from banking and government sectors, do not prefer to do anything on the cloud. Some of the small enterprises use the cloud."

"I'd like CDO to be the one-stop-shop where we could do all the configurations easily. It would be nice, for ASA upgrades, if we could do them from a central repository and not have to reach out to Cisco. That would be a definite plus."

"When logging into the device, we sort of had problems with it staying in sync. If somebody made a change onsite, it wouldn't do an automatic sync. It would have to wait, as you would have to do a manual sync up."

"There could be some slight improvements to navigation. In some of the navigation you've got to go back to be able to get into where you need to be once you've made a change. If I make a change, I've then got to go back to submit and send the change."

"Cisco Defense Orchestrator can improve by providing more support for third-party security components."

More Cisco Defense Orchestrator cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I compared the prices of AlgoSec with Tufin and FireMon. I don't recall the exact cost, but it was within budget and not very expensive. In addition to standard licensing fees, we didn't have any significant additional costs. We did hire new people for the change management process, but that's not a technology issue."

"When it comes to the cost of support and licensing, it is much cheaper than other competing products."

"It will reduce your operations costs with improved team performance."

"The licensing is very easy to set up, with flexible licensing methods such as subscription and perpetual."

"I personally feel that the cost is quite expensive. AlgoSec is charging for each function, e.g., Active change, Application ABF license, etc."

"AlgoSec is not a cheap product. If I compare Firemon and AlgoSec, because I am also Firemon certified, Firemon is still cheaper in price than AlgoSec."

"Setup cost and pricing were reasonable and the licensing was straightforward."

"Use the entire suite for its best benefits."

More AlgoSec pricing and cost advice

"It is covered under the CIsco Enterprise License Agreement (ELA). So, it is licensed and ours."

"If you compare to what is available on the market, they are in the same range with respect to pricing."

"I work with a lot of clients, and the price or value of the Cisco Defense Orchestrator can vary from one client to another. If you have a lot of Cisco solutions, the price of the Cisco Defense Orchestrator is justified. Whereas if you have some security components from other vendors, such as Check Point or Palo Alto. This solution would be a pretty expensive proposition considering that they don't integrate with them well."

"It is about a $100 per year for an ASA 5506 firewall, and from there it keeps going up if you have a bigger box. For example, the 5516 is $200 to $300 per year."

"It's around £500 per unit for a three-year license."

"After our free trial was done we got a subscription for three years and it was under $3,000 or so. It's part of the EA we already paid for, so I don't know what it would be if it was a la carte."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

20%

Financial Services Firm

18%

Manufacturing Company

Energy/Utilities Company

Computer Software Company

52%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Legal Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about AlgoSec?

AlgoSec's ability to integrate with various security and networking solutions enhances its overall value.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AlgoSec?

I am into operations and not aware of cost or pricing.

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What needs improvement with AlgoSec?

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Comparisons

Tufin Orchestration Suite vs AlgoSec

Compared 34% of the time

FireMon Security Manager vs AlgoSec

Compared 26% of the time

Skybox Security Suite vs AlgoSec

Compared 18% of the time

Palo Alto Networks Panorama vs AlgoSec

Compared 7% of the time

More AlgoSec Competitors

Palo Alto Networks Panorama vs Cisco Defense Orchestrator

Compared 40% of the time

Tufin Orchestration Suite vs Cisco Defense Orchestrator

Compared 30% of the time

More Cisco Defense Orchestrator Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

AlgoSec

February 2025

Download AlgoSec product report

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Defense Orchestrator

February 2025

Download Cisco Defense Orchestrator product report

Also Known As

No data available

CDO

Interactive Demo

Demo not available

AlgoSec

Cisco

Overview

AlgoSec, a global cybersecurity leader, empowers organizations to secure application connectivity and cloud-native applications throughout their multi-cloud and hybrid network. Trusted by more than 1,800 of the world’s leading organizations, AlgoSec’s application-centric approach enables to securely accelerate business application deployment by centrally managing application connectivity and security policies across the public clouds, private clouds, containers, and on-premises networks. Using its unique vendor-agnostic deep algorithm for intelligent change management automation, AlgoSec enables acceleration of digital transformation projects, helps prevent business application downtime and substantially reduces manual work and exposure to security risks. AlgoSec’s policy management and CNAPP platforms provide a single source for visibility into security and compliance issues within cloud-native applications as well as across the hybrid network environment, to ensure ongoing adherence to internet security standards, industry, and internal regulations. Learn how AlgoSec enables application owners, information security experts, DevSecOps and cloud security teams to deploy business applications up to 10 times faster while maintaining security at www.algosec.com.

AlgoSec

Cisco Defense Orchestrator (CDO) is a cloud-based management solution designed to ensure streamlined and consistent security policies across the Cisco security portfolio. Specifically tailored to manage all Cisco Secure Firewall form factors (running either ASA or Firepower Threat Defense (FTD) software), CDO offers real-time visibility and troubleshooting capabilities, effectively enhancing overall network security.

CDO addresses the challenges of migration, supporting transitions from on-premises to cloud environments and facilitating the shift from ASA to FTD configurations. As organizations embark on their cloud adoption journey, CDO simplifies provisioning workflows for remote branches, reduces operational expenditures related to inventory management, and offers scalability for multi-cloud deployments.

Cisco

Sample Customers

Maersk, Delta Airlines, Chevron, General Motors, T-Mobile, Chevron, AT&T, BP, Bell Canada, HCA Healthcare, Morgan Stanley, Unilever, Nationwide Insurance Enterprise, US Bank, Microsoft

Insurance Company of British Columbia, Shawmut

Buyer's Guide

AlgoSec vs. Cisco Defense Orchestrator

January 2025

Free Report: AlgoSec vs. Cisco Defense Orchestrator

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