Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps vs Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks comparison

Microsoft and Palo Alto Networks are both solutions in the Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) category. Microsoft is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.5, while Palo Alto Networks is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.0. Microsoft holds a 10.6% mindshare in CASB, compared to Palo Alto Networks’s 18.9% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of Palo Alto Networks users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 2025

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps and Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks are leading products in the cloud security category. While Microsoft Defender is ideal for those already immersed in the Microsoft ecosystem, Prisma Access is robust in security features and integration capabilities.

Features: Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps offers seamless integration with Microsoft services, comprehensive threat detection, and visibility across applications. It is highly beneficial for organizations using Microsoft technologies, allowing them to manage security within the ecosystem without external tools. Prisma Access provides zero-trust access, scalable VPN capabilities, and traffic protection for both web and non-web apps. It integrates effectively with third-party services, offering significant performance and visibility enhancements crucial for complex security requirements.

Room for Improvement: Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps could benefit from better integration with macOS and third-party platforms, as well as enhancements in user friendliness and reporting. Challenges include response times and false positive management. Pricing and management also have room for improvement. Prisma Access, while offering strong security, could improve its user interface and reduce latency issues in certain regions. It's also considered expensive and needs better integration and multi-cloud interoperability enhancements.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is flexible and easy to deploy within hybrid and public clouds, especially within the Microsoft ecosystem. However, customer service experiences can vary, with some reports of delayed support. Prisma Access is versatile across hybrid and public clouds but can be challenging to deploy. Customer service consistency varies, requiring improvement in support speed and reliability.

Pricing and ROI: Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is often bundled with Microsoft 365 licenses, providing cost benefits for existing users. It's competitive but expensive as a standalone purchase. Users report operational savings in tech infrastructure. Prisma Access is seen as expensive compared to competitors, but offers a comprehensive security package. Its licensing model is complex, but negotiable, with flexibility based on feature and support needs. Both solutions improve ROI by enhancing security posture and visibility.

To learn more, read our detailed Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps vs. Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks Report (Updated: January 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps vs. Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks

January 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

iboss

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) category, the mindshare of iboss is 1.8%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is 10.6%, down from 14.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks is 18.9%, up from 18.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB)

Featured Reviews

Matt Crockford

Head of Cybersecurity at SES Water

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

Read full review

Jagadeesh Gunasekaran

Cyber security engineer at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

Saves us time, has good visibility, and a single dashboard

The solution is user-friendly and provides great visibility into threats. There are easy options available for specific workflow inspections. We can also get support by going through the Microsoft documentation, which is straightforward. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps helps us prioritize threats across our enterprise. It covers us from a compliance perspective and protects our organization's data. Data protection is a very important aspect of any new organization, as we need to protect our data from both external attacks and insider threats. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps helps us monitor for abnormal activity by insiders, which is one of the most important access points for attackers today. Additionally, the different cloud apps that Defender for Cloud Apps supports provide us with much more visibility into potential threats and activities on the internet. We have integrated Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps alerts with Sentinel. The integration is straightforward. We can find the configuration details on Microsoft's official documentation website. If we are familiar with how Microsoft products work, we will be able to follow the instructions clearly. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps and Sentinel work natively together to deliver coordinated detection and response across our environment. Our integrated Microsoft solutions provide comprehensive threat protection, covering most of the tactics and techniques relevant to the MITRE ATT&CK framework. Sentinel allows us to ingest data from our entire ecosystem. When implementing an SIEM solution, there are always prerequisites such as Active Directory logs, security logs, firewall logs, and DNS logs. These are important logs that need to be ingested into the environment. Sentinel has many third-party connectors available that make integrations straightforward. Microsoft provides the configuration details in the Sentinel platform. It is important to integrate all relevant log sources into the SIEM solution so that we can detect and be alerted to any type of threat factor, whether it is from an internal or external source. Integrating third-party solutions into the platform requires a separate configuration, but Microsoft provides the necessary information. However, we need to have the appropriate permissions to execute these setups. Sentinel provides a centralized dashboard that covers threat management and configuration. It gives us complete insight into what entities are accessing, as well as full details for investigation. We can see how the alerts and threats are relevant to suspicious activities, whether they are related to malicious IP addresses, suspicious ASHAs, or any other indicators of compromise. All of this relevant data can be seen in a single pane. Recently, Microsoft introduced a new investigation experience in a single pane. This means that we can now get a lot of details in a single pane, without having to go there and execute a query. There are a lot of new insights being developed in the Sentinel platform these days. It has software intelligence. They recently introduced Microsoft Defender Threat Intelligence, which covers almost all IOCs. This protects organizational assets from threats and suspicious traffic associated with IOCs. If a match is found, alerts are generated. This is a very interesting feature. Another great feature is automation and logic apps. We can create a number of operations, such as posting in a team's channel if a severe incident occurs or sending an email notification. There are many operations available, so we can automate a lot of tasks. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps helps us stay compliant. It has predefined mechanisms in place to prevent attacks. For example, if an external user tries to access our SharePoint folders or files, an attack will be blocked. This is why it is important to give appropriate access to guest users. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps has many features and benefits. It provides a number of policies that can be configured to meet the specific needs of our security team. These policies can be used to customize cloud applications so that only authorized users can access them and perform operations that benefit the organization. In terms of safety and security, Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is top-notch. Using the solution's automation features, we can suppress false positive alerts. We can also close alerts, lower their severity from "high" to "low" or "informational," or close them immediately with the appropriate commands. This will depend on the configuration automation rule and the perspective from which we are testing. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps provides a single console. We are also provided with Microsoft templates to enable workbooks instantly. Alternatively, we can build our own customized workbooks to provide better insights and improve our SOC efficiency and overall performance. Consolidating all of our security data into one dashboard has saved our security operations team a significant amount of time. From an analyst's perspective, it is now much easier to correlate events, investigate alerts, and visualize specific entities. For example, an analyst can quickly see all of the alerts associated with a particular IP address, or they can view all of the activity for a specific entity over the past 24 hours or 7 days. This level of detail and insight would not be possible if our data were siloed in multiple dashboards. The single dashboard saves our operations approximately 20 hours per week by eliminating the need to access multiple consoles and tabs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps threat intelligence can help us prepare for potential threats before they happen. However, it depends on how we develop the policies for the database to block or ignore things in our environment.

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Partha Dash

Global Network Tech Lead at Thoughtworks

Makes us part of a bigger security ecosystem with updates taken care of for us, but pricing and support need work

There are definitely a number of things that could be improved. One of them is geographic coverage. China is still an issue because the solution does not operate there properly due to government regulations. I believe Palo Alto is trying pretty hard to get into partnerships with Alibaba and other cloud providers, but they do not have the same compelling offering in China that they have in the rest of the world. Businesses that are operating within China have to be very sure to evaluate the solution before making a buying decision. It is not an issue with Palo Alto, rather it is predominantly the result of government rules, but it's something that Palo Alto needs to work on. There is also room for improvement when it comes to latency in a couple of regions, including India and South America. They might have to increase their presence in those locations and come up with more modern cloud architectures. The third area is that, while Palo Alto has understood the essence of building capabilities around cloud technology and have come up with a CASB offering, that is a very new product. There are other companies that have better offerings for understanding cloud applications and have more graceful controls. That's something that Palo Alto needs to work on.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"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."

"Iboss is a solution that prevents advanced persistent threats, and has a zero tolerance for attacks."

"The solution has massively improved our security posture, giving us full visibility into what our staff does online."

"Granular setup, which was able to set different levels of filters using the OUs in the AD."

"Our primary use case for this product is DLP,"

"Content filtering is the most useful feature of iboss."

"iboss is pretty scalable. They provide good support. The case managers you work with to coordinate what you need are pretty good."

"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."

More iboss pros

"The most valuable feature of this solution is its monitoring."

"The ability to sanction unsanctioned apps using Secure Score benchmarking, included in Cloud, is also beneficial."

"The feature that helps us in detecting the sensitive information being shared has been very useful. In addition, the feature that allows MCAS to apply policies with SharePoint, Teams, and OneDrive is being used predominantly."

"The most valuable feature of Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is to stop shadow IT."

"The most valuable feature is the ease of management. It's important."

"Threat detection is its key feature, and that's why we use this tool. It gives an alert if a PC is attacked or there is any kind of anomaly, such as there is a spike in sending emails or we see an unauthorized website being accessed. So, it keeps us on our toes. We get to know that there is something wrong, and we can isolate the user and find any issues with it. So, threat detection is very robust in this tool."

"The product’s most valuable feature is SQL database."

"Defender's integration with our identity solutions is critical in our current setup."

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps pros

"The most valuable feature is the zero-trust part of this solution."

"It's quite reliable and performs well for users."

"The tool's consolidation is pretty quick."

"GlobalProtect has been beneficial for its cloud security capabilities, which are vital as businesses seek hybrid options and need to support remote workers while addressing latency issues."

"To quarantine and clean a malware file provides a lot of security."

"The solution is not very complex and is easy to manage for people who may or may not have knowledge about Palo Alto Networks."

"Prisma helped us build a moat around our production systems. It's now impossible to log into our production from a non-MDM laptop. Prisma Access provides decent security overall."

"It's very stable. Sometimes after installing the boxes, we leave them for one or two years. We would just touch the box in the case of the customer needing new requirements or changes to the setup."

More Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks pros

Cons

"Sometimes, obviously, there are bugs."

"I am currently doing a PoC of the zero trust aspect of it. Compared to other similar solutions, it is hard to get around each feature. It takes a while to get used to it."

"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."

"SSL decryption: We had issues with learners using apps instead of using web browsers. This type of encryption is tough for any appliance in a BYOD environment."

"The reporting feature needs improvement."

"To scale up, a new iboss Node Blade Chassis must be purchased."

"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."

"Sometimes the agent stops working in iboss, and we have to reinstall the agent."

More iboss cons

"Currently, reporting is not very straightforward and it needs to be enhanced. Specific reports are not included and you need to run a query, drill down, and then export it and share it. I would love to have reports with more fine-tuning or granularity, and more predefined reports."

"We are having trouble with our continuous reporting configuration and struggling with configuring the collector properly with our log parsing."

"I want them to enhance in-session policy."

"The insights could be improved, especially in reporting."

"The technical support team has room for improvement."

"There are challenges with detection and there are challenges with false-positive rates."

"The insights could be improved, especially in reporting. While it is possible for me to see the usage from different cloud apps, determining if critical data has been uploaded or if it is just normal transport data is difficult."

"The response time could be better. It will be helpful if the alerts are even more proactive and we can see more data. Currently, the data is a little bit weak. It is not complete. I can't just see it and completely know which user or which device it is. It takes some effort and time on my part to investigate and isolate a user. It would be great if it is more user-friendly or easy for people to understand."

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps cons

"Dependencies of applications sometimes is a bit confusing."

"I would like to see better pricing and an easier logging process. Also, if there was a way to log a global log, everything could go onto the system. It would be better if there was a third log, otherwise one would have to do everything manually."

"If you compare Prisma SaaS against other products, such as Cloud Log, it's a little bit tricky to understand, but it offers different functionality that other products don't have. From a user usability point of view, you need some training for this product, as an admin, you need a couple of demos."

"From any improvement perspective, the product's compatibility issues with Linux need to be resolved."

"Though the monitoring is fine, the solution should improve its application graphs and interface monitoring."

"Prisma would be a stronger solution if it could aggregate resources by project or by application. So say we have an application we've developed in AWS and five applications we've developed in Azure. The platform will group it according to those applications, but it's based on the tags we use in Azure, which means I have to rely on development teams to tag resources properly."

"The one thing that I've been a little bit disappointed with is when we have had to open cases with Palo Alto about Prisma Access issues. Versus their other platforms, like their firewalls, where we tend to get really quick responses and very definitive answers, the few tickets I've had to open for Prisma Access have taken them longer to respond to. And they haven't necessarily given me the kind of answer I was looking for, meaning a fix to the problem."

"Lacks a hybrid model which has API plus in-line security."

More Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks cons

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."

"It is expensive compared to one of its competitors."

"We have not priced the solution recently, but they were competitive with other vendors in the past."

"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."

"The price could be better and should be reconsidered."

"The pricing is fair."

"The cost could be improved when you need to pay for anything. For example, refreshing files takes time to load, though it may be my Internet. To improve the refresh time, Microsoft says that we need to pay for a Premium license, and I don't like paying for things that help make a solution better."

"The product's pricing seems fair."

"We are an MST and we do not pay for the solution. However, the price of the solution could be better."

"Its pricing is on the higher side. Its price is definitely very high for a small-scale company. As an enterprise client, we do get benefits from Microsoft. We get a discounted price because of the number of users we have in our company. We have a premier package, and with that, we do get a lot of discounts. There are no additional costs. It only comes in the top-tier packages. Generally, the top-tier license is the best license that you can get for your organization. If you want, you can buy it separately, but that's not a good idea."

"It has fair pricing. You pay for what you get. As far as I know, there are no costs in addition to the standard licensing fee."

"The pricing is a little bit high but right now, we are okay with it because of the compatibility with Office 365, Teams, and Azure AD."

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps pricing and cost advice

"It is pretty expensive. We have to balance the cost of some features. They need to work on some of the services and products, price-wise."

"We have to pay additional costs for maintenance and support services."

"The solution is expensive."

"It is a little expensive. Because it is one of the best in the market, it is a little bit more expensive than other vendors."

"As compared to other solutions, Prisma Access is much cheaper. It is probably 30% to 40% cheaper than other solutions, but I do not know the exact cost."

"Prisma Access is one of the best compared to other products on the market. The cost is favorable, and Palo Alto provides a simple architecture, so I recommend the solution to anyone using a different product. There are no hidden costs besides the license; what you see is what you get."

"Palo Alto is the Cadillac solution, so their products are pretty expensive. That's just the way it is. Their solution surpasses anything else. Cisco AnyConnect, Zscaler, and all of the other products don't compare. Palo Alto is the market leader with the most features. It saves you work, and you don't have to worry about it."

"There's no reason not to buy the enterprise version that gives you unlimited PoPs, but you must understand the limitations you impose on yourself if you do that. If you go crazy, that allowlist will be too big for Kubernetes clusters."

More Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

16%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Government

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.

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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, ...

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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...

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Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Microsoft Cloud App Security?

Cisco Umbrella is an integral component of the Cisco SASE architecture. It integrates security in a single, cloud-nat...

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What do you like most about Microsoft Cloud App Security?

It does a great job of monitoring and maintaining a security baseline. For us, that is a key element. The notificatio...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Cloud App Security?

I'm familiar with the licensing requirements to get our job done, but not from a pricing standpoint. That is not my job.

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What is the better solution - Prisma Access or Zscaler Private Access?

We looked into Prisma Access before choosing Zscaler Private Access (ZPA). Palo Alto’s Prisma Access is a secure ac...

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What do you like most about Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks?

The most valuable features of the solution are in the areas of the secure remote access it provides while also being ...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks?

The pricing is on the higher side, rating it around eight to nine out of ten. While it is justified for its value, th...

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Comparisons

Zscaler Internet Access vs iboss

Compared 19% of the time

Cisco Umbrella vs iboss

Compared 13% of the time

Netskope vs iboss

Compared 11% of the time

Cloudflare One vs iboss

Compared 9% of the time

Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange Platform vs iboss

Compared 8% of the time

More iboss Competitors

Zscaler Internet Access vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

Compared 23% of the time

Cisco Umbrella vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

Compared 16% of the time

Netskope vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

Compared 12% of the time

Skyhigh Security vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

Compared 5% of the time

Qualys VMDR vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

Compared 3% of the time

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps Competitors

Cisco Umbrella vs Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 12% of the time

Netskope vs Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 11% of the time

Zscaler Internet Access vs Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 8% of the time

FortiSASE vs Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 7% of the time

Microsoft Azure VPN Gateway vs Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 3% of the time

More Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

iboss

February 2025

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Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

February 2025

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps report

Download Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps product report

Buyer's Guide

Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks

February 2025

Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks report

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Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform

MS Cloud App Security, Microsoft Cloud App Security

Palo Alto Networks Prisma Access, Prisma Access, GlobalProtect, Palo Alto GlobalProtect Mobile Security Manager, Prisma SaaS by Palo Alto Networks, Prisma Access

Overview

iboss offers a comprehensive security platform designed for diverse use cases such as web filtering, data loss protection, corporate proxy services, and URL filtering.

iboss integrates advanced features to address dynamic security needs, leveraging its strength in SASE, ZTNA, AI initiatives, and cloud integration, while ensuring seamless operations for remote work. It excels in historical forensics, malware protection, and flexible cloud deployments. Users benefit from comprehensive traffic scanning, robust malware detection, and PaaS capabilities that reduce hardware management. An intuitive admin console ensures efficient management with content filtering and low false positives. SSL decryption enhances security, while DLP protects data in AI conversations. Deployment is rapid and scalable, allowing effortless integration with emerging technologies.

What features does iboss offer?

Granular Web Filtering: Provides precise control over web content access.
Traffic Scanning: Monitors data through multiple ports for security breaches.
Malware Detection: Ensures superior protection against malware threats.
PaaS Capabilities: Eliminates need for hardware management.
SSL Decryption: Enhances data protection by decrypting secure connections.
DLP Capabilities: Safeguards data during AI interactions.

What benefits and ROI should users consider?

Scalability: Adapts quickly to growing demands and emerging tech integration.
Rapid Deployment: Reduces time to implement security measures.
User-Friendly Admin Console: Facilitates efficient operations management.
Low False Positives: Increases accuracy of threat detection systems.

iboss finds significant application in sectors such as education, where web filtering for K-12 is crucial, and in corporate environments requiring robust proxy services and URL filtering for network security. Its adaptability is essential in scenarios demanding flexible, decentralized security frameworks, particularly for remote work setups.

iboss

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is a comprehensive security solution that provides protection for cloud-based applications and services. It offers real-time threat detection and response, as well as advanced analytics and reporting capabilities. With Defender for Cloud Apps, organizations can ensure the security of their cloud environments and safeguard against cyber threats. Whether you're running SaaS applications, IaaS workloads, or PaaS services, Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps can help you secure your cloud environment and protect your business from cyber threats.

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps Benefits:

Provides comprehensive security for cloud applications
Integrates with other Microsoft security tools
Easy to use and deploy
Provides real-time threat detection and response
Strong protection against phishing attacks and other common threats
Highly customizable to meet specific needs of different organizations

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps Use Cases:

Governance, authentication, security, and compliance.
Detects shadow IT and anomalous user behavior
Controls access to applications
Provides auditing and filtering setups
Used for end-user compute devices, file monitoring, user investigation, and activity
Used for data governance, threat detection, and getting visibility over cloud applications
Used to identify information about applications beyond organizational boundaries
Prevent exfiltration and data filtration of corporate data
Used to deal with spam emails and detect shadow IT

Reviews from Real Users

Ram-Krish, Cloud Security & Governance at a financial services firm, says that Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps "Integrates well and helps us in protecting sensitive information, but takes time to scan and apply the policies and cannot detect everything we need".

PeerSpot user, Senior Cloud & Security Consultant at a tech services, writes that Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps "Great for monitoring user activity and protecting data while integrating well with other applications".

Simon Burgess,Infrastructure Engineer at SBITSC, states that Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is "A fluid, intelligent product for great visibility, centralized management, and increased uptime".

Microsoft

Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks provides consistent security for all users and applications across your remote networks. Prisma Access grants users safe access to the cloud and data center applications and the internet as well. In addition, the solution combines all of your security and networking capabilities into a single cloud-delivered platform, enabling flexible hybrid workforces.

Prisma Access can be managed two ways:

Cloud Managed
Panorama Managed

Prisma Access delivers both networking and security services, including:

SD-WAN
VPN
Zero Trust network access (ZTNA)
Quality of service (QoS)
Clean Pipe
Firewall as a service (FWaaS)
DNS Security
Threat Prevention
Cloud secure web gateway (SWG)
Data loss prevention (DLP)
Cloud access security broker (CASB)

Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks Features

Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks has many valuable key features including: App-ID, User-ID, Device-ID, SSL Decryption, Dynamic User Group (DUG) Monitoring, AI/ML-Based Detection, IoT Security, Reporting, URL Filtering, Enterprise Data Loss Prevention (DLP), Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM)*, Logging, Policy Automation, Intrusion Prevention System (IPS), and many more.

Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks Benefits

Some of the benefits of using Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks include:

Security: Prisma Access gives you consistent security to protect against cyberattacks, with enforcement of policy at every location. By implementing Prisma Access, you also gain protection that works to prevent known and unknown malware, exploits, credential theft, command and control, and many other attack vectors across all ports and protocols.
Global connectivity: Prisma Access provides global coverage through use of its connectivity layer.
Scalability: With Prisma Access, scaling is automatically managed and is scalable, flexible, and agile.
Instant deployment: Deployment is fast, eliminating wasted time that may otherwise be associated with setting up a solution, operating it, or shipping hardware in order to get started.

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics

users who are currently using the solution.

PeerSpot user Partha D., Global Network Tech Lead at a computer software company, speaks about his experience using the product, saying, "It protects all app traffic so that users can gain access to all apps. Unlike other solutions that only work from ports 80 and 443, which are predominantly for web traffic, Prisma Access covers all protocols and works on all traffic patterns... The most sophisticated attacks can arise from sources that are not behind 80/443."

Tejas J., a Sr. Cloud Security Architect at a computer software company, mentions that "it is geographically dispersed, and it sits on top of Google and AWS platforms. Therefore, you don't face the standard issues, such as latency or bandwidth issues, that you usually face in the case of on-prem data centers.”

Another PeerSpot reviewer, Max I., Associate Director at Cognizant, comments that "Security is absolutely spot-on, really top-notch. It's the result of all the components that come together, such as the HIP [Host Information Profile] and components like Forcepoint, providing end-user content inspection, and antivirus. It incorporates DLP features and that's fantastic because Prisma Access makes sure that all of the essential prerequisites are in place before a user can log in or can be tunneled into."

Palo Alto Networks

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.

Customers for Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps include Accenture, St. Luke’s University Health Network, Ansell, and Nakilat.

Concord Hospital, State of Colorado, Essilor International, RheinLand Versicherungsgruppe, University of Westminster, Universidade Nove de Julho, SPAR Austria, CAME Group, ZipRealty, Greenhill & Co., IKT Agder, Aviva Stadium, Animal Logic, Management & Training Corporation, Brigham Young University Hawaii, School District of Chilliwack

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps vs. Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks

January 2025

Free Report: Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps vs. Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks

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