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Fortinet FortiMail vs Fortra's Clearswift Secure Email Gateway comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

Microsoft Defender for Offi...
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Ranking in Email Security
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (9th)
Fortinet FortiMail
Ranking in Email Security
4th
Average Rating
8.6
Number of Reviews
57
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Fortra's Clearswift Secure ...
Ranking in Email Security
40th
Average Rating
8.6
Number of Reviews
0
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2024, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is 16.7%, down from 20.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiMail is 7.6%, down from 8.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortra's Clearswift Secure Email Gateway is 0.6%, down from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

Luis-Brown - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 8, 2023
Allows for easy reporting of problems, valuable anti-phishing, and anti-malware support
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 lacks proactivity in assisting us with preparing for potential threats before they occur. While they employ a substantial amount of threat intelligence to preemptively prevent incidents, their effectiveness diminishes when it comes to delivering proactive threat intelligence alerts from Microsoft. Their focus primarily revolves around managing the internal environment. On the other hand, my other vendor, Check Point, along with my membership in MS-ISAC, supplements me with this type of information. The phishing and spam filters could use some improvement. It is adequate, but it doesn't match the quality of Proofpoint or Mimecast. However, it comes close in effectiveness. Plus, if we're obtaining it for free, investing in the other products seems impractical.
EG
Dec 16, 2022
Good GUI and configuring security policies is easy but the pricing needs improvement
The initial setup isn't too complex. I'd rate it seven out of ten. If people know how to set up email security, it is easier. You have to have the basic knowledge of how to set up email security and how to create policies. Any security person who's been in this field for a long time will be able to do it within an hour or two. You do require a minimum of at least two to three people to handle it. You need to have one from the incident-response team who will handle the incidents, analyze the incidents, and then, basically, take a response or action on the activity. Another person should be available to generate reports and, basically, review the reports and provide them to audits and the compliance team. You also need a person who knows the whole system by heart and who's experienced in it.
it_user746937 - PeerSpot reviewer
Oct 2, 2017
Facilitates creation of your own content-filtering policies with relative ease
Ability to create message bypasses for groups and/or individuals. Meaning, you do not have to "whitelist" email domains or addresses when a specific bypass will do. Personal Message Manager (PMM): It allows users to release or delete quarantined messages. Also, allows users to add people to a…

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 is protection against malicious links, fishing, and impersonation. You can train people to be aware of these threats, but they're not always careful. When they're using their phones between meetings, they click on a link, and it's game over."
"The initial setup is straightforward. You just add the license, click it, and then you can set up the rules. It is quite simple."
"Defender enables us to secure all 365-related activity from a single place. It gives us visibility into everything happening in Outlook, protecting us against phishing and other email-based threats. Defender helps us detect any suspicious behaviors."
"Defender for Office 365 has helped eliminate having to look at multiple dashboards and that is the aspect I like most about it. It is simpler, effective, and convenient. The users like the process efficiency."
"The basic features are okay and I'm satisfied with the Defender."
"The most valuable feature is the integration. It's a single console, so we don't have to switch around between multiple products. Another valuable feature is the ease of operations and maintenance."
"The email protection is excellent, especially in terms of anti-phishing policies."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 helps people to work remotely. It is a secure solution. We don't need to use our company's computers or get VPN connections to the networks. I can control how they share screens and what they send to the devices. It keeps our organizations confidential and sensitive information safe."
"They have a feature called CDR, Content Disarm, Reconstruction, click protection, and DLP for encryption purposes."
"The solution is very, very stable."
"The solution has a user-friendly interface. It is easy to deploy and handle. You can easily troubleshoot the issues of the solution."
"The GUI isn't hard to use. When we do a demo and explain the features of Fortinet products to our customers, they understand very quickly. They can easily manage their systems without us."
"Fortinet FortiMail's most valuable features are antispam, antivirus, database, and data loss prevention (DLP)."
"This excellent email gateway minimizes spam, inspects suspicious emails and isolates infected attachments with little administrative effort."
"Technical support is great. They're available 24/7 and their response time is typically within the hour."
"The anti-spam feature is very valuable."
"Ability to create your own content-filtering policies with relative ease."
"A stable solution."
 

Cons

"The UI needs to be more user-friendly."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365's Mac functionality requires improvement to deliver the same level of protection found on Windows devices."
"We need a separate license and we don't know how to get the license that is required."
"The pre-sales cost calculations could be more transparent."
"We need to be able to whitelist data at the backend."
"There is room for improvement with the UI."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 could improve by giving customers information on techniques to prevent threats. For example, information about best practices on how to protect their own devices against hackers and scammers, such as educational information or training. This would help others have a better understanding of cyber security. Additionally, there can be more security features added."
"In some situations, it has not been able to pick impersonated emails having no attachments. Technical support definitely has a scope for improvement."
"The web console management interface could be improved."
"The support could be faster because we've been receiving complaints from customers, they say that when they raise a ticket, it doesn't take 24 hours to respond, sometimes the support responds after three days. This is a lot of time."
"An additional feature that could be added is a pop-up screen notifying you that an email has been blocked, without having to double click on it to take you there it could provide you with a summary explaining why it was on hold or why was it spam when you hover over it with your cursor."
"The infrastructure could be improved."
"There are features that other solutions have that this one is lacking, such as reporting options. I hope in future releases they advance their features list."
"It's difficult for me to talk about areas for improvement in Fortinet FortiMail because I'm the general manager of the company and I'm an engineer with knowledge about the solution, but I'm not deeply involved in its implementation. As I mentioned previously, Fortinet FortiMail is also being used within the company, and I'm happy with its functionality, but sometimes, attacks pass and avoid the Fortinet FortiMail filters, but those could be very sophisticated attacks. There could still be an improvement in the filtering feature of the solution, though the security of Fortinet FortiMail is okay for me because I believe you can't implement one hundred percent security in any solution. The initial setup for the solution also needs improvement. The setup is supposed to be simple, but then the customer starts to complain that some of the false positive emails are reaching quarantine, so my team has to configure it again. There have been instances when Fortinet FortiMail rejects valid emails because some of the service partners of the customer have not been configured accurately, so the system considered valid mails as attacks to be quarantined, so aside from improving the filters, there should also be an improvement in the categorization of emails in the server. My team has to modify the configuration so that valid emails could pass and for Fortinet FortiMail to correctly filter the SPAM traffic. A feature that could be added to Fortinet FortiMail in its next release is advanced AI, so it can analyze and decide accurately on which mail is valid and which mail is SPAM."
"High Availability needs improvement."
"I think the security of the product could improve."
"FTP server and TRUST Manager functionality."
"Malware needs improvement."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The license is expensive because the cost is based on the number of users."
"For licensing, it's usually a yearly package for customers who are subscribed to Office 365, but they can also pay on a monthly basis."
"For large enterprise organizations, they can definitely afford it, but for small and medium organizations, they might struggle to cover the expenses."
"I was working in the government and it was too expensive for us to use our Microsoft products."
"Compared to other brands, Microsoft Defender for Office 365's pricing is competitive."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 comes with Microsoft Windows. It is free with the operating system."
"I know that the product is incredibly expensive."
"It is much more expensive than using another solution because we have had to include some options and upgrade our license."
"The product's licensing part depends on the number of mailboxes and the hard disk needed by customers. The cost of the license depends on the number of mailboxes and the number of emails."
"My company has a three-year license for Fortinet FortiMail, including the support, but I'm not so sure of how much the solution costs because I'm not part of the procurement team. What's more important to me is the functionality and stability of Fortinet FortiMail. In terms of Fortinet FortiMail licensing, the cost is calculated based on company requirements. For example, it's based on the features you need for your environment, on capacity, how many CPUs you have, etc."
"Pricing is straight-forward and renewable without complicated pricing structures."
"The price is acceptable for the support license it includes."
"It is reasonable."
"There is a license required for this solution and it is on an annual basis. I am satisfied with the price."
"9,000 Euro per annum for Fortinet Mail and sandbox."
"The licensing model for this solution is better because it is based on the box and not the number of users."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
6%
Educational Organization
47%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
5%
Financial Services Firm
4%
Computer Software Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Government
13%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
Threat Explorer is an invaluable tool for me, and it plays a crucial role in helping me discern the origins of variou...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
While Microsoft Defender for Office 365 necessitates pricier E3 or E5 subscriptions, the extensive functionality offe...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is a very good solution that allows you to use a single port or tool to control eve...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiMail?
The price of Fortinet FortiMail steadily increases every year. There is a possible ten percent increase. It's concern...
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiMail?
The solution's pricing could be improved.
Ask a question
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Also Known As

MS Defender for Office 365
FortiMail
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Learn More

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is trusted by companies such as Ithaca College.
Magromer Cueros y Pieles S.A.
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Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet FortiMail vs. Fortra's Clearswift Secure Email Gateway and other solutions. Updated: August 2024.
800,688 professionals have used our research since 2012.