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Check Point Web Gateway vs Cisco Web Security Appliance comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 4, 2024

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

iboss
Sponsored
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
12th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Internet Security (4th), Web Content Filtering (4th), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (8th), ZTNA as a Service (12th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (11th)
Check Point Web Gateway
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
11th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Cisco Web Security Appliance
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
10th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Secure Web Gateways (SWG) category, the mindshare of iboss is 1.9%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Check Point Web Gateway is 1.1%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Web Security Appliance is 2.4%, down from 3.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
 

Featured Reviews

Matt Crockford - PeerSpot reviewer
It's easy to roll out, and their understanding of our business made it seamless
One aspect we value about iboss is its simplicity. Their customer service is brilliant, and they are super responsive and knowledgeable. It's easy to roll out, and their understanding of our business made it seamless. We were impressed by the solution's mental health function, which can detect if someone needs help. It scans what users are browsing and flags warning signs so we can check to see if they are okay. We've had to use it a couple of times. The user interface is highly intuitive. Our IT team picked it up with minimal training. It's arranged so that it's easy to find where things are. Another advantage is the single pane of glass console, which gives you visibility into what's happening. We're not fully there yet because we haven't implemented zero trust, but we're excited about the possibilities from the demos we've seen. We launched a POC of iboss' ChatGPT Risk Protection feature two weeks ago. AI is a great tool, but you need to be careful what you put into it. My biggest fear is employees inputting sensitive corporate information or customer PII data into one of these chatbots. I was impressed by our trial of the feature. It's exactly what we wanted. Now, when a user goes to ChatGPT, there's a banner warning them not to share information, and we can block conversations containing customer data like bank details and email addresses. I don't want to stop people from using it, but we need visibility. We've only tried it on a test group of 15 people. You can configure it to look for specific keywords or integrate it with your DLP policy if you have that configured
Ajinkya Mohod - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers cost-effectiveness and is user-friendly
In terms of the effectiveness of the threat prevention technology in Check Point Web Gateway, the tool helps secure our company's environment, as threat detection and blocking work well. Others can definitely go ahead with the tool, especially if they want to secure their networks and manage firewalls or network traffic. In terms of the benefits offered by the product, I can say that it helps in securing network parameters, environments from network attacks, lateral movements within an environment, blocking of traffic, and managing the traffic. The tool improves our company's cybersecurity posture. I rate the tool a nine out of ten.
IgnitiusMolepo - PeerSpot reviewer
Ensures security for remote workers
The Cisco Web Security Appliance provides DLP to organizations. It helps prevent the unauthorized transmission of sensitive information by blocking such attempts. Additionally, it safeguards against malware attacks, particularly on websites not authorized by our company. Its role in protecting us from malware is pivotal. The organization itself handles the configuration and management of Cisco Web Security Appliance. Cisco assists in deploying and configuring the appliance and managing all associated services. Integrating the Cisco Web Security Appliance with other solutions is quite challenging. For instance, when we tried to integrate Netscape KSP, we encountered difficulties retrieving logs. Additionally, our solution failed to interact with the Web Security Appliance. Overall, the integration process remains problematic, hindering the effectiveness of our security infrastructure. We have both the cloud version and the on-premises version. For clients who require data sovereignty, we offer the on-premises version, which includes a data sovereignty tool. This allows them to enforce policies that prevent the transfer of logs to third-party data centres, ensuring compliance with their country's regulations. Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"iboss has significantly lowered the number of security incidents. It is crazy how much it blocks and how much it is aware of the outside danger."
"It was a very easy product to install. It can be deployed very fast."
"Our primary use case for this product is DLP,"
"Because of iboss, I did not have to assign web filtering tasks to my techs on a daily basis."
"Valuable features: Within the filter: Controls (Web categories, applications, and Allow/Block list) and Network (local Subnets). Within the reporter: Logs (Event Log) and Reports."
"We were impressed by the solution's mental health function, which can detect if someone needs help. It scans what users are browsing and flags warning signs so we can check to see if they are okay. We've had to use it a couple of times."
"Technical support is pretty sharp and very responsive."
"iboss is easy to use despite its complexity. Multiple engineers manage it, but it's significantly more straightforward to administer than traditional VPNs and web proxies."
"The product is very user-friendly."
"The most valuable features of the solution are the HTTPS inspection mechanism, application control, and URL filtering."
"The implementation of this tool was straightforward."
"You don't have to wander around the tool since it is very simple. You can grab and get a hold of the tool very quickly."
"I think this solution is very helpful to our customers because its cloud-based security can be deployed quickly and maintained easily."
"Application control gives IT teams an opportunity to set suitable policies that can be used by all teams when coding."
"The interface is simply amazing."
"SmartConsole is intuitive."
"This appliance gives me good visibility in the userbase and their activities."
"It also allows you to decrypt SSL traffic, and that's a really important feature as well, which is something I also configured."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"The solution provides good web reputation and anti-malware protection."
"It's a scalable product."
"Since working with the tool, we have not found any threats in our organization."
"This solution offers categorization for YouTube and other specific applications from Facebook to WhatsApp, which can be controlled whether it's on mobile or PC."
"The tool has good Umbrella DNS security."
 

Cons

"Sometimes, obviously, there are bugs."
"Its pricing could be better."
"Their on-premise hardware's network interface is capped at one gigabit, which is sort of a problem. If you stand a filter up where all traffic flows through that, according to them, in order to go above a gigabit, you have to have multiple devices, which in today's IT seems a little bit silly. They could easily put in an SFP port into their device that could accommodate 10 gigs or at least offer a box."
"The reporting feature needs improvement. It doesn't give you the expected results. It is quite difficult to get the specific reports needed, and it is not as intuitive as the rest of the platform."
"Fold that in with the risk intelligence they're getting from all of the different subscriptions they are a part of. Now, these security companies subscribe to things like emerging threats, databases, etc. You can fold all this intelligence to decide what's happening on an endpoint. I would love to see them start moving into that space. That would compete directly with Microsoft. Maybe that's why they haven't. Having that ability native within the solution would be great. The other area in which I would love to see improvement is more detailed descriptions of why they block websites."
"Iboss is growing so fast that it is often hard for them to keep up with the challenges."
"File integrity monitoring would be very advantageous as an additional feature."
"Sometimes when you call in support, you get someone who is just following a sheet. It feels like a runaround. You feel that you are running into that support wall."
"The learning curve is complex for new users."
"Some documents needed to implement with the best practices are difficult to understand, take longer than expected to apply, and sometimes even require support."
"We would really benefit from some more visual features that can help view the impact of the security gateway in the organization."
"The documentation must be improved."
"It is expensive. Its price should be better."
"I would like to be able to see an integration with centralized management services."
"The tool's response time can be improved since sometimes it lags, but not always...The tool's UI should be made more dynamic."
"Check Point Web Gateway could add an end point access function."
"Sometimes reporting is a little bit short."
"The solution is priced high."
"The one thing I don't like about Cisco is that they are very much fragmented in terms of providing the complete solution. They keep on breaking their different feature sets into different boxes."
"They need a better graphical interface, and they need a better ISE mechanism."
"It should have a user-based quota, per-user quota, that can be defined on the appliance."
"The solution could improve the graphical user interface. It is not up to the regular standard of what we would expect from Cisco. Additionally, they need to improve the categorization when blocking in the settings. The CLI could have a better view than the graphical user interface but I did not investigate further."
"We would like to see a security service head, where we can combine all the security into one solution."
"If a user wants to use it for other devices like mobile or smartphones, this product isn't so reliable."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is not expensive, and it is also not cheap. iboss is priced right in the sweet spot for the number of features it offers."
"We have not priced the solution recently, but they were competitive with other vendors in the past."
"It is expensive compared to one of its competitors."
"It is probably in line with other solutions, but I do not deal with the financial side."
"The overall pricing for iboss is very competitive and transparent."
"This program is very, very expensive."
"Our customers pay a licensing fee annually or once in three or five years, per their requirements."
"The product is not cheap. It is expensive."
"It is expensive. Licensing is on a yearly basis. You need to do the support subscription."
"If one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the tool's price as a seven out of ten."
"There is a need to make yearly payments towards the licensing charges attached to the product. The product is neither too expensive nor too cheap, so it comes at a good price point for my company."
"The price is on the higher side, even when compared to Azure Firewall Premium."
"The price is very high."
"This is an expensive solution."
"I know from the manager that the price is too high and that other solutions offer the same features for less."
"Regarding Cisco price-wise, it is always on a bit on the higher side."
"The tool's licensing is yearly."
"When you compare the price of this solution to the price of FortiGate, it's high."
"There is a subscription-based license needed to use this solution."
"Licensing fees are based on the number of users."
"The solution has a standard license."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
19%
Government
19%
Healthcare Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
21%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Non Profit
9%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about iboss?
Content filtering is the most useful feature of iboss.
What needs improvement with iboss?
I have the same complaint about them that I have about other software companies. Sometimes when you call in support, ...
What is your primary use case for iboss?
We are a PreK-12 public school district, and we use iboss to filter internet content for our students at home and sta...
What do you like most about Check Point Web Gateway?
You don't have to wander around the tool since it is very simple. You can grab and get a hold of the tool very quickly.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Check Point Web Gateway?
I don't have a comparison with other products. I know that Check Point is relatively expensive compared to its compet...
What needs improvement with Check Point Web Gateway?
Authentication is only possible through Check Point Identity Awareness technology, limiting some customers' deploymen...
What do you like most about Cisco Web Security Appliance?
The most valuable features of the solution are the functions of proxy for the users who use the internet and the secu...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Web Security Appliance?
Comparing with other products, Cisco has more functionality, but pricing is a challenge. Cisco is not a product for s...
What needs improvement with Cisco Web Security Appliance?
With the WebAssign integration, it is not easy when I am integrating policies within the company, especially with NAN...
 

Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform
No data available
Cisco WSA, Cisco Web Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

More than 4,000 global enterprises trust the iboss Cloud Platform to support their modern workforces, including a large number of Fortune 50 companies.
Morton Salt, Medical Advocacy and Outreach, BH Telecom, Lightbeam Health Solutions, X by Orange, Cadence, Nihondentsu, Datastream Connexion, Good Sam, Omnyway, FIASA, Pacific Life, Banco del Pacifico, Control Southern, Xero, Centrify, Tradair, Laterlite, Phoenix International, Unisinos, Wilkin Chapman, Connexus Energy, Mutua Universal, Smart & Final, Central New Mexico Community Colleg, Grupo Financiero Multiva
New South Wales Rural Fire Service, Caixa Seguradora
Find out what your peers are saying about Check Point Web Gateway vs. Cisco Web Security Appliance and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.