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Cisco Secure Network Analytics vs NETSCOUT InfiniStreamNG comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 10, 2024
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Secure Network Analytics
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
24th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
59
Ranking in other categories
Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (3rd), Network Detection and Response (NDR) (5th), Cisco Security Portfolio (3rd)
NETSCOUT InfiniStreamNG
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
77th
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2024, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure Network Analytics is 1.5%, down from 1.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NETSCOUT InfiniStreamNG is 0.3%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Rainier S. - PeerSpot reviewer
You are able to drill down into a center's utilization, then create reports based on it
In the last year or two, we have been working with our Cisco NAS engineers to improve our security posturing. It is more our being proactive rather than reactive. While Stealthwatch and Lancope have this ability to look inside and give you visibility (a great feature), follow-up is the rule. We would like filters that you can put into place to tap onto certain types of behaviors, alerts out, and/or hopefully a block. This is sort of what we are looking for. I might be speaking too early, because we are not down this path yet. We know the feature set is there, we just do not know yet how to achieve it. That is proactive rather than more reactive. For Lancope Stealthwatch, we would like to see it more on the ASA Firewall platform. While this might already be available, this is more a failing of Cisco to inform us if it is there. For example: * Are we on the right or wrong version of the code? * What does the code look like? * Are we are really looking at firewalls? Or is it more about the foundation and route switches that we are seeing? It is about visibility.
Michael Gideon Genita - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to set up with good documentation and helpful support
I'm using it for a customer The packet flow switch is the most valuable aspect of the solution.  It's an easy product to set up. We can scale the solution if we need to. It's stable.  The documentation is well-written and quite useful. It's compatible with other products.  Under the pocket flow…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of this solution is the way the net flow is being merged together in a single pane. That's been extremely useful for us, because can see what's going on with traffic in one single place."
"The ability to send data flow from other places and have them all in one place is very valuable for us."
"It works efficiently for encrypted traffic analysis."
"The most valuable feature is anomaly detection, where it finds things that are not allowed internally."
"Another notable feature of Cisco Secure Network Analytics is its Layer 7 visibility, which allows us to monitor and analyze network communications at the application layer."
"Cisco Stealthwatch has predefined alerts for different types of security issues that might happen in the network. Whether it's PCs or servers that are used for botnets or Bitcoin mining we receive the alerts automatically. This functionality is what we receive from the solution out of the box."
"The search options on Cisco Stealthwatch are the most valuable. You can get very granular with it, down to the kilobits or the seconds if you want. The product supports any time frame that you need, so that is nice."
"Visibility. The ability to look East and West. To see what is passing through your circuits, where it is coming from, and how big it is."
"I love the single pane of glass view. It makes it easier to not have to navigate everywhere. It allows more simplistic visibility, without having to go from tool to tool to tool, or from window to window to window."
"It helps us get to root cause quickly. With utilization and consumption of bandwidth, we can usually see what application is taking as much as they should (or shouldn't), then account for it accordingly."
"It helps us to assist our customers to isolate problems. If it is us who is having the problem, then we can use it to streamline the process."
"The product is stable. I have never had any issue where we have lost an InfiniStream, or visibility from that particular InfiniStream, throughout the bank."
"The technical support is really good. They will go above and beyond, if you are running into a problem. You can go to a sales engineer, who will engage technical support to help you out."
"It allows us to get quicker resolutions. We can see exactly what is using up the bandwidth, so we can assist end users."
"When we have mobile operators who are signal partners, where one is the roaming host and another is the roamer, we are able to see their traffic. Their packets are able to detect if any faults to develop, and at what point they fail."
"The most valuable feature is utilization."
 

Cons

"Cisco Stealthwatch can improve by having bundled packages for popular add-ons. It would be a lot easier for people implementing it, have let's say a better way to use the product."
"Better integration between Cisco Secure Network Analytics and Cisco Secure Workload would be beneficial."
"Complexity on integration is not so straightforward and you really need an expert to help build it out."
"There's a lot of traffic on our network that we don't see sometimes."
"Many of these tools require extensive on-premises hardware to run."
"I would like to see some improvement when it comes to reporting."
"It is time-consuming to set it up and understand how the tool works."
"It would be better to let people know, up front, that is doesn't give you nice, clear information, as seen in the demos, without Cisco ISE installed."
"Being able to manage the packet flow switches in nGeniusONE would be great."
"The single pane of glass feed still needs work."
"The stability depends on who is using the tool, because you only can get as much out of the tool as you put into it. There are a lot of patches for this particular environment, so you have to keep on them. If you lose track of them, then the product is not useful anymore."
"Only problems that we have had are fiber issues going into the TAPs or vSTREAMs, which are usually local site issues."
"We don't use the single pane of glass view, even though we own it."
"The monitoring and reporting tool needs improvement. Users want more information, such as the level of detail when doing a packet analysis. They want more detail to be able to isolate down to a specific point."
"I would like to see an improved level of stitching between IPs."
"There is a timeout feature that we have been asking for awhile."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is not cheaply priced."
"It has a subscription model. There is yearly support, and there is also three-year support. It depends on what the customers want."
"NetFlow is very expensive."
"The yearly licensing cost is about $50,000."
"Today, we are part of the big Cisco ELA, and it is a la carte. We can get orders for whatever we want. At the end of the day, we have to pay for it in one big expense, but that is fine. We are okay with that."
"There are additional licenses needed for the number of so-called network flows. It's hard to plan the number of flows you need in the network, this is a problem. The price of the Cisco Stealthwatch is relatively inexpensive"
"One of the things which bugs me about Lancope is the licensing. We understand how licensing works. Our problem is when we bought and purchased most of these Lancope devices, we did so with our sister company. Somewhere within the purchase and distribution, licensing got mixed up. That is all on Cisco, and it is their responsibility. They allotted some of our sister company's equipment to us, and some of our equipment to them. To date, they have never been able to fix it."
"Licensing is done by flows per second, not including outside>in traffic."
"The price is a little high."
"I would like it to be more scalable with less spend."
"The scalability is good, but it comes at a cost. E.g., if you need 100 InfiniStream because you are sending gigs or terabytes of data to one InfiniStream, then you will have to purchase another InfiniStream, which are not cheap."
"To capture more with the solution that we bought, you have to buy another InfiniStreamNG, and there are only four ports in the back."
"This product could be cheaper."
"It can be scalable. It just costs too much. With a company as big as ours, it gets too expensive to accommodate every single site."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
30%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco Stealthwatch?
The most valuable feature of Cisco Secure Network Analytics is the Threat Intelligence integration.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Stealthwatch?
The tool is not cheaply priced. In cybersecurity, you want an extra layer of security in your organization. Some sectors want NDR solutions, so you cannot deploy such tools everywhere, as they are ...
What needs improvement with Cisco Stealthwatch?
The expensive nature of the tool is an area of concern where improvements are required.
Ask a question
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Also Known As

Cisco Stealthwatch, Cisco Stealthwatch Enterprise, Lancope StealthWatch
InfiniStreamNG, NETSCOUT ISNG, Infinistream
 

Learn More

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Edge Web Hosting, Telenor Norway, Ivy Tech Community College of Indiana, Webster Financial Corporation, Westinghouse Electric, VMware, TIAA-CREF
U.S. Department of Defense
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Network Analytics vs. NETSCOUT InfiniStreamNG and other solutions. Updated: December 2024.
824,053 professionals have used our research since 2012.