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Cisco Duo vs Fortinet FortiAuthenticator comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 24, 2024
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Duo
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
3rd
Ranking in Authentication Systems
2nd
Ranking in Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)
1st
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
58
Ranking in other categories
ZTNA as a Service (6th), Cisco Security Portfolio (6th)
Fortinet FortiAuthenticator
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
6th
Ranking in Authentication Systems
3rd
Ranking in Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
59
Ranking in other categories
Identity Management (IM) (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2024, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of Cisco Duo is 8.8%, down from 9.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiAuthenticator is 10.3%, up from 10.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Single Sign-On (SSO)
 

Featured Reviews

RyanDeppe - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps reduce the risk of a breach and is easy to deploy and onboard
For our customers, Duo Security is a significant advantage because it provides them with a straightforward method to implement MFA across their entire environment. Moreover, once we delve into the more advanced features of Duo Security, it enables us as a partner to engage in ongoing discussions regarding security strategies with our customers. Initially, we may only introduce them to MFA during the onboarding process. However, as their security strategy evolves, we can leverage Duo to perform additional tasks such as risk-based assessments and deployments, thereby assisting in the development of their security measures. Duo Security helps secure our infrastructure. It serves as our gateway layer of protection, allowing us to understand who is logging in and why. We conduct risk-based assessments on each user to determine whether their actions are appropriate or not. Duo Security is not a comprehensive security solution, but it is undoubtedly a crucial component, a critical layer of security. This aspect resonates with our customers consistently. Their ability to reduce the risk of a breach is of utmost importance. It serves as the primary line of defense. Currently, credential gathering and leaks are widespread in the market. By implementing an MFA solution like Duo Security, we can effectively prevent these issues. When we put a stop to credential harvesting, it becomes much harder for attackers to infiltrate and navigate our network. Therefore, Duo Security acts as an excellent first line of defense. User authentication and device verification are the methods through which we envision our customers navigating in order to prevent identity-based attacks. Initially, when we employ Duo Security, it is a straightforward implementation of multi-factor authentication. As we progress, we enhance security measures by incorporating device risk assessment and potentially even regional assessment. This includes considerations such as whether the login is being attempted from a specific IP address. These gradual enhancements contribute to the establishment of an additional layer of protection. Thus, it is not necessary to implement a completely disruptive strategy right from the start. Instead, it is possible to gradually adopt and integrate this approach, following a crawl, walk, or run methodology. The Duo Security self-service portal helps free up our customers' IT staff time, allowing them to focus on other projects. As a Cisco partner, we have received feedback from our customers that the portal is highly interactive, enabling them to easily navigate and resolve issues. After setting up their Duo environment, we rarely receive callbacks for assistance, as the portal is intuitive and empowers users to handle everything they need on their own. The appealing aspect of Duo Security is its ability to establish trust for every access request, regardless of its origin. It is a cloud-based solution with excellent API integrations. It doesn't matter where or how a user logs in; Duo will be there to protect the user, whether it's through MFA, risk assessment, or similar methods. It is extremely beneficial to our customers that Duo Security considers all resources as external. Our customers frequently inquire about a zero-trust model, and this is a key component of it. Unfortunately, I would love to say that there is a simple solution for zero trust where we can just deploy this solution and be done with it. But that's not the case. It requires a layered approach, and that's what we convey to our customers. Duo Security is definitely a part of that. Duo Security has helped improve our customers' cybersecurity resilience. Internally, it protects our users from accessing sales operations-based environments. Additionally, our customers use it regularly to protect business-critical applications.
Rias_Majeed - PeerSpot reviewer
Once configured properly, it runs smoothly with minimal potential for misconfiguration and enhances security by providing two-factor authentication
Customer service and support are helpful, but in the last few years, I've found that the first-level support isn't able to understand the issue. They escalate to the tier-two level, who are able to resolve it. On the first level, it takes time. Maybe they have grown too big and aren't able to give each network the unique attention it deserves. We customize some implementations, and at that time, they're not able to help because the people supporting are new and not from the field. The training seems fine, but in practice, it's different. Their support is not that great anymore. A little arrogance is there. It doesn't qualify them very well if there's arrogance in their communication. They do not understand the issue. That's why you're coming back to support. For example, one issue I'm facing is when a person leaves the organization without handing over details. They'll send an email to that person, but that person is not available. How are you going to access this email? These are a few instances where we are finding it difficult, and they take more than a week or two to resolve some issues. Their support used to be very good, but now that they're on top, they're not as responsive at the first-level support.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"If you have to log in to something, you must go to Duo Security to confirm that you're who you are on your phone."
"It's easy to use for the security part, and it helps to improve our security posture."
"The multi-factor authentication process and the geo-locking features are great."
"The most valuable aspect is the authentication and the SSO."
"The solution is easy to use."
"The flexibility is the most valuable feature. We use it for the app on the phone. When we're at different locations, the phone is usually there, so we can use that. It has just been a very flexible option."
"The single pane of glass management works very well. That feature is very important because we have a lot of admins who have to manage Duo, and it's much easier when it's a single pane of glass. That single pane is also great because it's easy to enroll new devices."
"The single pane of glass management is very important and it is part of the reason we went with Duo. Anything we can do to save time for our administrators, help desk staff, and engineers, is valuable to us."
"Enables easy integration, allowing for 2FA with our VPN."
"The technical support for FortiAuthenticator is excellent."
"The most valuable feature is the OTP on the mobile phone."
"It reduces the need for network administrator intervention by allowing the user to perform their own registration and resolve their own password problems and issues."
"The integration into tools, including CI/CD pipelines, is easy and handy."
"Features the addition and removal of access as needed for the VPN."
"We have a perpetual license for 2FA."
"Simple to deploy, simple to use, and user-friendly."
 

Cons

"The only challenge is finding the right person sometimes. From what I've seen, being a named account is a big deal."
"Duo Security should have more customized use cases. For example, if a client needs to have more customization, it would be better to connect directly with Duo's R&D to try to discuss the issues together in order to add customizations."
"For upgrades, there should be a better notification of when they're coming out. We always have a testing phase, so we need to be ahead of it. It takes us longer before we can upgrade to the newest version."
"I would like to see Duo Security increase the time that the users have to log into the devices. The maximum time interval is 50 minutes at the moment, and I would like it to be 60 minutes. When you try to log into a device and have to authenticate yourself, sometimes it's not very pleasant. It's not the best thing particularly if you have to do this every 50 minutes, which is the maximum time that Duo gives. This makes it difficult to use and does not save time."
"Certain customers can not use this product because it is cloud-based."
"The product price needs improvement."
"We found it difficult to integrate it into our broader product family of Microsoft tools and other applications used across our organization."
"We use Yubikey for pushing it to the phones. Yubikeys can get expensive because people tend to lose those for some reason. Fifty dollars a device is pretty high."
"There are some protocols, such as SHA and SHA-2, that are not supported."
"There are multiple areas that are in need of improvement. It is not a mature product."
"We have issues with HA (high availability). These should be addressed in future releases."
"It does not consider customer requirements."
"The hardware aspect of the solution could be improved. We are not really able to understand the hardware capabilities of the device."
"The stability of Fortinet FortiAuthenticator is rated as six out of ten, indicating some instability issues."
"There have been numerous support tickets sent to Fortinet since this does not appear to be a mature product."
"If you want some other FortiAuthenticator from one site to another site, you should have requirements, but really if you have authentication and directory or another solution, you should change the password of the authenticator between the solution and the directory and other things. So transfer of data and other information should be simpler."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product’s pricing is reasonable."
"Our licensing fee is currently on an annual basis."
"I am not aware of the pricing. There are two departments, and I don't have any information about them."
"It's very simple. Its price is fair. We use the hardware tokens as well. You get what you pay for. In terms of licensing, Cisco has very complicated products, but Duo Security was surprisingly easy."
"It has a fair pricing model. I know they have different tiers, but it would be nice to have different types of licenses for certain groups of users in our organization. That way, we wouldn't have to lump everybody into one group. That would be also one complaint."
"The pricing is pretty competitive. It's pretty cheap. Anybody can adopt it."
"Price wise, it's not cheap, but it's not expensive at all either. It's in the middle."
"It falls in line with everything else."
"FAC is an affordable solution for Middle Range (200E/400E) and also needs a package of mobility agents (2,000) perpetual."
"On a scale of one to ten, where one is a high price and ten is a low price, I rate the pricing a seven."
"The customers need to pay for licenses, and some pay on a yearly basis while others pay on a three-yearly or five-yearly basis. Also, it is not an expensive solution."
"The cost of the license could be less expensive. The license is paid on a yearly basis."
"I would rate the pricing a four out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. It is not that costly. It is cheap, easy to manage, easy to install, and easy to configure."
"It's not expensive."
"The price seems okay. It's not that expensive compared to other authenticators."
"It is usually cheap. Without a license, you can use some basic features. You can buy a 20-year license and implement the solution once."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
25%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Computer Software Company
18%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Duo Security compare with Microsoft Authenticator?
We switched to Duo Security for identity verification. We’d been using a competitor but got the chance to evaluate Duo for 30 days, and we could not be happier. Duo Security is easy to configure a...
What do you like most about Duo Security?
They are users who, as mentioned before, utilize RDPAP and MDPAP. It includes functionalities related to finance, specifically in single sign-on.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Duo Security?
I would rate the pricing of Cisco Duo as a seven on a scale of one to ten, which means it is quite expensive.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiAuthenticator?
The cost of FortiAuthenticator is rated high due to market conditions. Nevertheless, I rated its cost an eight on a scale of one to ten.
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiAuthenticator?
The technical support could be improved as some staff lacks the necessary knowledge to assist effectively.
 

Also Known As

Duo Security
FortiAuthenticator
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Duo vs. Fortinet FortiAuthenticator and other solutions. Updated: November 2024.
824,053 professionals have used our research since 2012.