Binary Defense MDR vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks comparison

The compared Binary Defense and Palo Alto Networks solutions aren't in the same category. Binary Defense is ranked #7 in MDR , with an average rating of 9.3, and holds a 0.6% mindshare in the category. Palo Alto Networks is ranked #4 in EPP , with an average rating of 8.7, and holds a 4.0% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Binary Defense users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of Palo Alto Networks users who would recommend it.

Binary Defense MDR

Read 16 Binary Defense MDR reviews

2,472 Views
204 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Net...

Read 89 Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks reviews

16,556 Views
9,737 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

Binary Defense MDR

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Net...

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Binary Defense MDR and Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about CrowdStrike, Huntress, Arctic Wolf Networks and others in Managed Detection and Response (MDR).

To learn more, read our detailed Managed Detection and Response (MDR) Report (Updated: March 2025).

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Managed Detection and Response (MDR)

March 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

Binary Defense MDR

Average Rating

9.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Managed Detection and Response (MDR) (7th)

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Net...

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (4th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (7th), Ransomware Protection (2nd), AI-Powered Cybersecurity Platforms (5th)

Mindshare comparison

Binary Defense MDR and Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Binary Defense MDR is designed for Managed Detection and Response (MDR) and holds a mindshare of 0.6%, up 0.4% compared to last year.
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks, on the other hand, focuses on Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP), holds 4.0% mindshare, down 5.2% since last year.

Managed Detection and Response (MDR)

Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)

Featured Reviews

Rich Ullom

AVP, IT Security Compliance and Audit/Information Security Officer at Western Reserve Group

Worth the money, fantastic communication, and fast service with an average response time of about four minutes on an alert

This is my third SOC. I have never had anybody react as well. So, it's hard for me to provide something that they could do better because I'm really happy with them. I just signed another three-year contract with them. I don't find any downside to them, but if I have to put one, it would be consistent manpower or staffing. The only area where the solution can be improved is going to be with people. As they grow, they are struggling with the same thing that every other company is, which is getting talent and getting that talent to stay, but they've just revised their tiering system to go from a flat analyst and manager to a three-tier solution where it goes through two or three before it gets elevated. That seems to have worked out well, so if one level misses it, the next one picks it up, and it works out fine. Consistent staffing is the only challenge they have because when you're hiring level-one analysts, you go through them pretty quickly. You'll probably hire them at 50K or 55K, and after they do it for a year, they find out they can make 85K somewhere else, and they bounce. So, their turnover is a little high, but that's it.

Read full review

Mohammad Qaw

Senior Security Consultant at helpag

Perfect correlation and XDR capabilities for network traffic plus endpoint security

The solution should force customers to integrate with network traffic to see the full benefits of XDR. If you are not integrating it or feeding in your network traffic, then you are just buying a normal antivirus which doesn't make any sense. You are paying double the price to use the antivirus feature or to say you have XDR, but in reality you are not using it. The solution should include an on-premises option because some customers want only on-premises. It would be hard, but good to do if possible. Open XDR would be beneficial in the future. Right now, the solution is Closed XDR so cannot communicate with the few new vendors in the Open XDR market.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"With Binary Defense, we don't just get an alert, but also a detailed rundown of why they're alerting us on it. They tell us what was executed, or the username, script, or IP. That way, we're not wasting time investigating."

"The speed at which their services are reactive is valuable. Nowadays, when a threat hits an endpoint, you've got minutes, not hours or days. Their average response time is about four minutes on an alert. For anything that needs to be sent to us, it's about fourteen minutes, which is pretty good. They're the third SOC that I've used in fifteen years. By far, they are the quickest ones to act. When you're looking at prevention, that's a key factor."

"One of the main benefits of Binary Defense MDR is the ability to easily meet with their support team to discuss any issues we encounter."

"Binary Defense's most valuable feature is the 24/7 monitoring and threat hunting. Their team checks the latest breaches and how they're done."

"Binary Defense has a human service department that provides live monitoring for our systems."

"The customization has been the most valuable aspect and was really the reason we ended up selecting Binary Defense. They worked with us to provide exactly the level of support, features, response, and collaboration we needed."

"The best part about Binary Defense MDR is that it runs on everything, and they keep an eye on things 24/7."

"The most valuable feature is reviewing tickets and the notes added by technicians."

More Binary Defense MDR pros

"The most valuable feature is that you can select remote access of any machine for sandboxing."

"The solution's most valuable feature is the user interface."

"The product's initial setup phase is very easy."

"WildFire AI is the best option for this product."

"The tool's use cases are relevant to security."

"Cortex covers everything I need. It's a perfect solution. Cortex provides a different level of visibility because it's an extended EDR, allowing you to grab logs from the network and firewalls. Palo Alto invented the concept of the extended EDR or XDR."

"The stability of the solution is very good. We have about 100 users on it right now, and we use it twice a week."

"Traps is quite a stable product. Once it was properly deployed and configured, you have nothing to be worried about."

More Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks pros

Cons

"The only area for improvement that I can think of relates to statistical analysis for SLAs. They are in the middle of moving to a new product called D3 which is going to do some backend work for them. I know they are working to improve some of the help desk statistics, such as the time the tickets open and the time they are closed."

"We found that an earlier version of the agent had high memory usage and that was a bit concerning, but we raised the concern with their support team and they immediately replied that they had noticed the same thing and had a candidate fix already available... it totally fixed the issue."

"It's sometimes difficult to know when to engage Binary Defense or TrustedSec, their sister company. TrustedSec is more focused on offensive security, as opposed to the defensive security that the MDR solution provides. It would be awesome if there were a better bridge between that relationship for when we need to get more proactive services or when we need to do a penetration test."

"I would like to get more reports from Binary Defense about what they're blocking."

"The most significant area for improvement is in support for non-English speakers; we're a global organization, so many of our users are not English speakers, which can make interacting with them a challenge. There's no Chinese language support, so we must rely on what we can do with the internet. We don't expect Binary Defense to build a language staff, but details can get lost in translation when we assume the whole world speaks English."

"The current reporting system could benefit from improvement."

"I would like to see more frequent check-ins with our security status."

"We should be able to isolate devices faster. They should shorten the time between clicking on a device to contain it and carrying out the action. That would be a welcome improvement."

More Binary Defense MDR cons

"Although I would say this product is highly-rated, it could probably do more because nothing does everything that you want."

"The encryption is not up to the mark."

"In terms of areas of improvement, we have not completed our review of the product. We're also looking at other products. So, it's a little bit hard to tell what could be different because we have not completed the review of this product, but based on our experience so far, its implementation is quite complex."

"Cortex XDR is trickier to configure than other Palo Alto products. This is one area where we are not so satisfied."

"The product's pricing needs improvement. They could provide more discounts. Additionally, the dashboard and control panel could be enhanced."

"The playbooks could be improved to include more functionalities or actions."

"I don't like that they have different types of licenses. For example, if users select a license, they think they will have all the platforms they need to improve their network or security. But after some time, Palo Alto Networks changed their licensing, and some of the features that, for example, were free at the beginning now have a cost. I think the integration can be improved. For example, a lot of tools are just integrated through APIs."

"It is not easy to sell Cortex XDR, not because it isn't a good tool. Its marketing needs to be improved."

More Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"From the initial cost that Binary Defense came in with, we pared it down quite a bit over the course of 30 or 60 days. My leadership would say that their cost was high, but realistically, they were in line with the market."

"It's valued at the right price. Even with the number of endpoints we have, we don't feel that it's a lot more than any competitor. In fact, it might be less expensive when you look at the fact that you're getting a full flex SOC out of it along with the tools."

"Binary Defense has changed its pricing model from being primarily based on the volume of data to one based on escalations and incidents they handle."

"It has been good. We have saved money, and we have a better product."

"The pricing is very good. They are definitely competitive and they were lower at the time that we went with them."

"The solution's price is spot on; if anything, it's slightly below the norm for most services. Compared to building the same team internally, it would cost more to create the same amount of capability than what we get from an external team. Price-wise, Binary Defense is in a great spot."

"After we acquired this platform, we met with a number of different vendors. Binary Defense came in with a proposal that was surprisingly affordable. In fact, we were able to recoup the cost of their services within a short period of time. This is because Binary Defense is able to provide the same level of security as a team of two or three in-house analysts but at a fraction of the cost. As a result, Binary Defense is saving us an estimated $250,000 to $300,000 per year."

"The pricing is on target. Working with their sales team on pricing negotiations was a pleasant process. They were very respectful of the constraints we had and I feel that we're paying a fair price."

More Binary Defense MDR pricing and cost advice

"In terms of the cost Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is very expensive because we are a Mexican company and when you translate dollars to pesos the cost is very high. The solution is very expensive for Mexican companies. I understand that they have international prices, but I do not think it offsets the price enough for many companies in countries, such as Mexico. The amount it is reduced is not a massive percentage."

"Compared to CrowdStrike, Cortex XDR is an expensive solution."

"The cost depends on your chosen license type, like Pro or other licenses."

"Its pricing is kind of in line with its competitors and everybody else out there."

"The price of the solution could be reduced. I have customers that have voiced that the solution is good for the value but if I want to sell more of the solution the price reduction would help."

"It is present, but when compared to other competitive products, I would say it is not less expensive; however, when all of the other added values are considered, the price is reasonable."

"This is an expensive solution."

"The return on investment is from the user side because we have seen the performance of it increase the delivery time of the product if we are using too many web-based and on-premise applications. In indirect ways, we saw the return of investment in terms of performance and user satisfaction increase."

More Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

17%

Healthcare Company

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Binary Defense MDR?

The most valuable feature is reviewing tickets and the notes added by technicians.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Binary Defense MDR?

It has been good. We have saved money, and we have a better product. We are a company that has become an enterprise from a small medium business in two years. Our company passed a certain dollar ma...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Binary Defense MDR?

We are going to have a meeting with them the following Monday. It will be our first quarterly business review. Half of it is going to be looking at new products and new functions that they are brin...

See all answers

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. Sentinel One

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. SentinelOne SentinelOne offers very detailed specifics with regard to risks or attacks. The ability to reverse damage caused by ransomware with minimal interruptions to...

See all answers

Comparing CrowdStrike Falcon to Cortex XDR (Palo Alto)

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. CrowdStrike Falcon Both Cortex XDR and Crowd Strike Falcon offer cloud-based solutions that are very scalable, secure, and user-friendly. Cortex XDR by Palo Alto offers ...

See all answers

How is Cortex XDR compared with Microsoft Defender?

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a cloud-delivered endpoint security solution. The tool reduces the attack surface, applies behavioral-based endpoint protection and response, and includes risk-ba...

See all answers

Comparisons

CrowdStrike Falcon vs Binary Defense MDR

Compared 29% of the time

Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response vs Binary Defense MDR

Compared 19% of the time

Darktrace vs Binary Defense MDR

Compared 15% of the time

SentinelOne Singularity Complete vs Binary Defense MDR

Compared 13% of the time

VMware Carbon Black Endpoint vs Binary Defense MDR

Compared 9% of the time

More Binary Defense MDR Competitors

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 12% of the time

CrowdStrike Falcon vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 7% of the time

Darktrace vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 6% of the time

Wazuh vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 5% of the time

Check Point Harmony Endpoint vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 4% of the time

More Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Binary Defense MDR

March 2025

Download Binary Defense MDR product report

Buyer's Guide

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

March 2025

Download Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks product report

Also Known As

Binary Defense Vision, Binary Defense Managed Detection and Response, Binary Defense Managed Detection & Response

Cyvera, Cortex XDR, Palo Alto Networks Traps

Overview

Binary Defense provides a Managed Detection and Response service using an Open XDR strategy that detects and isolates threats early in the attack lifecycle. Expert security analysts in the Binary Defense Security Operations Center leverage an attacker’s mindset, monitoring your environments for security events 24x7x365 and acting as an extension of your security teams. When a security event occurs, Binary Defense analysts triage, disposition, and prioritize the event. Analysts conduct full kill chain analysis and supply tactical and strategic mitigation recommendations to your security team with the goal of increasing your organization’s security posture against the latest adversary threats.

Visit us online at https://www.binarydefense.com

Binary Defense

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks delivers comprehensive endpoint security, integrating well with other systems to offer robust threat detection and real-time protection through AI-driven analytics.

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks offers advanced endpoint protection and threat detection through AI and behavior-based analytics. Its user-friendly design simplifies integration with firewalls, delivering multi-layered protection with low resource consumption. Valued for policy management, USB control, and incident correlation, Cortex XDR enhances threat management and real-time threat hunting capabilities. However, users note challenges with third-party integration, reporting, and dashboard automation. Agent performance across operating systems and memory consumption are areas for improvement, alongside reducing false positives and simplifying endpoint management and setup.

What features does Cortex XDR offer?

Behavior-Based Detection: Analyzes user behavior to identify suspicious activities.
AI Analytics: Utilizes AI for accurate threat detection and response.
Real-Time Protection: Provides immediate defense against threats.
Policy Management: Allows customization of security policies across endpoints.
USB Control: Regulates USB device access for added security.
Incident Correlation: Connects and analyzes various security events for better response.
Firewall Integration: Seamlessly works with firewalls for enhanced security.
Machine Learning Capabilities: Continuously improves threat detection precision.

What benefits should be considered in reviews?

Low Resource Consumption: Efficient security functions without taxing system resources.
Multi-Layered Protection: Comprehensive security across multiple attack vectors.
User-Friendly Interface: Intuitive design for easier management.
Enhanced Threat Management: Identifies and mitigates threats effectively.
Real-Time Threat Hunting: Proactively searches for and mitigates potential threats.

Cortex XDR is crucial in industries requiring robust endpoint protection, such as finance, healthcare, and technology. It supports malware detection, behavioral analysis, and ransomware mitigation across endpoints, including remote work environments, providing comprehensive threat visibility and security policy management. The solution's integration with firewalls and specialized industry requirements enhances security posture in diverse operational settings.

Palo Alto Networks

Sample Customers

Securitas USA, Black Hills Energy, Lincoln Electric,The J.M. Smuckers Company, New York Community Bank, State of Connecticut, NCR

CBI Health Group, University Honda, VakifBank

Buyer's Guide

Managed Detection and Response (MDR)

March 2025

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