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Okta Workforce Identity vs Symantec Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA) comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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 ZTNA as a Service
12th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (12th), Internet Security (4th), Web Content Filtering (4th), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (8th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (10th)
Okta Workforce Identity
Ranking in ZTNA as a Service
9th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
64
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (5th), Authentication Systems (6th), Privileged Access Management (PAM) (6th), Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) (2nd), Access Management (4th)
Symantec Zero Trust Network...
Ranking in ZTNA as a Service
20th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.4
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
Access Management (19th), ZTNA (15th)
 

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
Tor Nordhagen - PeerSpot reviewer
Extremely easy to work with, simple to set up, and reasonably priced
The drawback of this solution is that in our shops, many staff members sometimes have to be borrowed from one shop to another and the solution does not really support having multiple roles. The user experience we would like to have when a person works in shop A which pays their salary is that they should have access to pretty much everything. Maybe you have somebody who is a manager in that shop A, he should be able to order new wear, he should be able to change the pricing, he should be able to empty the cash registry, and ship it to the bank. But when for instance, in COVID, people had to fill in for people in shops where a lot of people were sick, then they had to actually use user accounts of people that work in shop B. If you were employed in shop A, you could not work in shop B without borrowing somebody else's user ID and password. Which is really bad. We haven't been able to work around that and Okta Workforce Identity does not have a solution for it. We are now piloting their identity governance solution. Obviously, it's easy to give somebody access, give them an account, and give them roles, but it's hard to maintain that. For example, if you moved from, say working in a shop to working in a warehouse. But why do you still have all this shop access? The solution has until now not had anything to really support the process of taking away access. But now we are in a better release program of Okta's identity governance solution. Although it's very basic, the solution has started on a journey, but identity governance is something that Okta Workforce Identity really needs to improve. The ability or the options in the solution for changing the look and feel are not good enough because in our partner portal, essentially what they have is an ugly admin interface. The admin interface is good enough for us technical people because that's all we need. We work with the product and we're able to see the data but when it comes to presenting the service portal, Okta Workforce Identity does not have any capabilities really for making it look pretty. To add branding and different graphical user interface elements than Okta basic for essentially delegated admin for the business-to-business portal is horrifying because you're essentially using the tech admin. The only option we had and used, was to take the tech admin console and strip it. so that a vendor that has some goods that are sold in the shops, when they want to add a user on their side, say a driver or a packer on their side who should know how much they've packed in a truck to come to our warehouse, then the user interface that this vendor is using, these functional people will then have to use an extremely basic user interface.
cto543714 - PeerSpot reviewer
Restricts access to applications but improvement is needed in integrations
Over the last year, I have been working with customers because it's changing and maturing. These things are rolled out in segments and chunks, not all at once. Additional internal work is often required to make it functional, such as properly configuring the active directory. This internal work can take up to three months. The process varies, and implementing Symantec ZTNA quickly is not realistic. I wouldn't recommend the tool to non-core customers because you won't get the support you need. I'd rate Symantec ZTNA a seven on a scale of one to ten. They're still integrating different pieces into their solution. The challenge with ZTNA is that different companies implement it slightly differently, with some features present in one product but missing in another. ZTNA is a tricky acronym that companies use, but when you look closely, you find that each vendor might only have some of the expected features.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"From a use-case scenario, what I like the most is the plug-in. I like the fact that we can do the filtering of these devices offsite independent of the network they are connected to, and we do not have to have traffic coming back inside our network."
"Iboss is a solution that prevents advanced persistent threats, and has a zero tolerance for attacks."
"Our primary use case for this product is DLP,"
"The iboss system is highly reliable. The false positive rates are small compared to some other systems we've experienced through other partner agencies who use competing solutions."
"The solution has massively improved our security posture, giving us full visibility into what our staff does online."
"Content filtering is the most useful feature of iboss."
"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 security aspect of the solution, particularly the malware behind it, is excellent. That's something that really helped us out. It's not just a simple proxy that just blocks the insights of potential threats that come on behind it. They do malware detection and that helps us a lot."
"Other than Okta being an easy and awesome integration tool, one of the best features it has is the provisioning and deprovisioning, which makes management way easier. You don't need to be too technical to understand how it works."
"Okta has introduced the Universal Directory. It has custom attribute capability and user permissions to read/write on their profiles or hide them. Profile sources and identity profile sourcing are two different components that I haven't seen in other products."
"This solution has a lot of capabilities and features."
"Having a single sign-on to all our applications."
"Okta integrates well with other solutions. Once you have integrated an application into Okta and onboarded a user, they will be onboarded for just-in-time provisioning."
"The most valuable features depend on a customer's needs. Our customers generally find multi-factor authentication very useful."
"It is flexible and easy to install."
"What I found most valuable in Okta Workforce Identity is that it worked together with VMware Workspace One, so there was this device check at the same time. My company used the trusted device method that enabled you to define that only the trusted devices including the Workspace One agent were able to access the applications directly without an additional authentication step."
"The most valuable feature of this product is restricting and controlling what people have access to. If I want a contractor to connect to my network, I can give them access to only the specific things they need without giving them full VPN access to my entire network. That's the main benefit everyone gets from it. The value depends on how many users and applications you have and what you want to share."
 

Cons

"Sometimes, obviously, there are bugs."
"Its pricing could be better."
"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."
"Iboss is growing so fast that it is often hard for them to keep up with the challenges."
"Sometimes the agent stops working in iboss, and we have to reinstall the agent."
"File integrity monitoring would be very advantageous as an additional feature."
"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."
"To scale up, a new iboss Node Blade Chassis must be purchased."
"The only aspect in which it can be improved is that the interface could be cleaner. I found this even when I was trying to do my certification exam because the certification is hands-on. You find yourself fumbling around a little bit to find simple things. This happens even when you start to get familiar with the product."
"We have experienced some challenges in integrating this solution with Scope and Cognito."
"Therefore, if you have 10 million users, that's almost 100 million, so it is costly."
"It is challenging to obtain a comprehensive backup."
"They also have single sign-on (SSO). When we bought Okta Workforce Identity a year and a half ago, I was also looking at SSO, but not much documentation was available for SSO. The documentation for SSO should be a little more robust for somebody who is implementing it for the first time."
"The product is expensive compared to other tools."
"A room for improvement in Okta Workforce Identity is its price. It could be cheaper. The biggest benefit of the solution is that everything works securely without extra steps, so you're saving on your workforce's time and effort because your applications work smoothly and securely, but you'd need to pay some amount of money for that. Another area that could be improved, though not necessarily regarding Okta Workforce Identity, is the SSO applications because so many of the source applications charge extra money to put the SSO to work, which means you have to buy a more expensive license. Nowadays, SSO is a mainstream functionality and it should be out-of-the-box in those applications because it's so easy to set up."
"It's not compatible with on-premises installations, unless you host it as a SaaS. We were not able to do that. For example, imagine a scenario where the cloud is not available. Then, Okta will not work for you. That use case will readily fail because it doesn't have an on-premises installation that you can use to authenticate or provide identity and access management. If you have a purely on-premises solution that is not connected to the internet, then this will not work. This is one area that can be improved."
"For areas of improvement, the main issue is with integrations. The Symantec ZTNA comprises many products cobbled together on the back end. Sometimes, the integrations work well; sometimes, they don't. For example, if you want to use two-factor authentication, you need to integrate that into the solution. Or if you want to accept protocols other than web coming to your secure gateway, that's another integration. Supporting different devices like Macs, Samsung phones, or iPhones also requires more integrations. Ensuring all these integrations work properly is an ongoing process and a moving target."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is probably in line with other solutions, but I do not deal with the financial side."
"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."
"The overall pricing for iboss is very competitive and transparent."
"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."
"The product's price is high. For each feature, a certain payment is required."
"The pricing for Okta Workforce Identity could still be improved or made cheaper. It costs from 50 to 100 euros a year per user. Okta Workforce Identity has different packages you can choose from, and my previous company had all of them, particularly the full Okta suite."
"The licensing is per user per month and includes full technical support."
"This is an expensive solution but the security makes it worthwhile."
"The price of Okta Workforce Identity is reasonable."
"The price of the solution is good."
"It is costly for large companies."
"The licensing model is fine for general service usage. However, the charges for API features and API tokens can be quite high."
"Pricing varies depending on the situation. In competitive situations, it's usually priced competitively. Nobody pays the full MSRP. Typically, you negotiate and work with them on the pricing."
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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
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

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 Okta Workforce Identity?
Okta has introduced the Universal Directory. It has custom attribute capability and user permissions to read/write on...
What needs improvement with Okta Workforce Identity?
We are facing one issue with Cypress test cases. Whenever I write Cypress test cases, we encounter problems with logg...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Symantec Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA)?
Pricing varies depending on the situation. In competitive situations, it's usually priced competitively. Nobody pays ...
What needs improvement with Symantec Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA)?
For areas of improvement, the main issue is with integrations. The Symantec ZTNA comprises many products cobbled toge...
What is your primary use case for Symantec Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA)?
The solution helps to allow access only to what is explicitly needed. This means restricting access to specific appli...
 

Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform
No data available
Symantec Secure Access Cloud, Luminate.io, Luminate
 

Learn More

 

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.
FedEx, Zoom, Takeda, Lululemon Athletica, GrunHub, jetBlue, McKensson, Bain & Company, Engie, Peloton, Sonos, T-Mobile, Hewlett Packard, MGM Resorts, Ally Financial, Priceline, Albertsons, Itercom, Classy, FICO, Kensho, Live Nation, Drata, Rotary, and others.
NEX, AIG, Fiverr, Upwork
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831,158 professionals have used our research since 2012.