Forcepoint Secure Web Gateway Reviews

The Forcepoint client software can be downloaded on a user's machine so that it can filter the sites from home or the office. That's one of the biggest features. We can use it for filtering our laptops for our users at any place.

One of the most important areas of improvement would be the support because we faced a lot of problems when we were on-prem.

I've been using Forcepoint Secure Web Gateway for about four years.

Right now, Forcepoint is stable. Before, when it was on-prem, it wasn't stable at all. We needed to restart it and reload it many times.

Forcepoint is scalable enough to host our infrastructure. We have more than 3,000 users. I don't know if it could be bigger or not, but right now, it's enough for us.

I rate Forcepoint Secure Web Gateway seven out of 10. I would rate it higher, but it has a problem with tablets and the iPhone. It's not filtering on these platforms. It filters on Windows but not iOS or Android.

Public Cloud

We are a solution provider for a variety of products including web security, next-generation firewalls, and DLP. Forcepoint Web Security is one of the products that we implement for our clients.

The most valuable feature is security, which is very strong.

Once deployed, the management console is simple and easy to use.

In the on-premises version, I don't like the deployment and structuring of the device. It is time-consuming and not as easy to implement as Blue Coat Web Security.

I have been using Forcepoint for about one year.

Forcepoint is stable but not 100%. This solution is Websense-based and because of structure, there is some instability. In general, if it is implemented properly then it will be stable.

While the product is scalable, from a hardware perspective, it may need to be upgraded. It is not a modular appliance, but rather, a server.

Our customers are enterprise-level businesses, in general.

The technical support is very good. Here, in Saudi Arabia, service engineers are very cooperative and the Forcepoint team has a good number of people. Of course, nobody is perfect.

We used to use Blue Coat solutions but in the past couple of years, our business has turned to Forcepoint. Blue Coat Web Security is very easy to implement and configure, more so than Forcepoint.

I have also tried the cloud-based deployment of Forcepoint and it works well. It is very functional and very fine. However, we haven't sold any cloud-based subscriptions because our customers have all wanted on-premises solutions.

The initial setup is somewhat complicated. Implementing this solution and deploying the servers is the challenge. It has to be planned properly but once it is complete, the security features work properly.

The length of time for deployment depends on whether the customer is ready and has all of the prerequisites in place. If everything is ready then the deployment will take a maximum of one week. One problem we sometimes face is that the customer says they are ready and has verified that the prerequisites are in place, but in fact, once we visit the customer we find out that they are not. In cases like this, or when the information we need is not clear, it can take longer to implement.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

On-premises

We are using this solution for web security.

I have found the web content filtering and malware filter the most valuable.

There should be more hardware models available and the application control could improve.

I have been using this solution for approximately 10 years.

The hardware is stable. However, recently we experienced some technical issues that took some time to resolves.

Technical support can give a good solution for issues but it can take a lot of time to receive it. They could improve by being faster.

The setup is very easy.

The price of this solution is reasonable.

I rate Forcepoint Secure Web Gateway an eight out of ten.

On-premises

Primary use is as web proxies for a government agency.

This product improved the security of web traffic in our environment.

Most valuable features were content filtering and monitoring. As a government agency, it is highly important that the internet is being used for appropriate reasons and we need to track inappropriate behavior.

There were several issues with the product.

• Version 8.4 can only be managed with a CLI, they removed the nice GUI interface from version 8.1. 
• The load-balancing needs massive improvements.
• The incident lists don’t sync between appliances, they need to be manually edited for each one.

One to three years.

Real-time category protection.

There is less need to investigate if a site is malicious. The majority of site gets reported.

• Database synchronization failures
• Encrypted packet inspection

10 years.

The latest deployment was a fairly smooth transition, but previous upgrades and hardware replacements have been very painful.

Stability has been good with this version of code (can say the say with previous versions).

No, but we have stayed with the same scale and have not needed to scale anything.

Customer Service:

They are okay. We haven't needed to deal with them too much.

Technical Support:

Depends on what tech you get.

Prior to my position here, but I would know what.

Our environment is complex, so it is hard to say.

We implemented using a vendor team.

I don't track this.

Due to staffing needs, we did not consider other solutions.

It is fairly easy to setup and use. I like the way you can have varying policies based on users and IP address ranges. Preset categories cover many websites, and can be useful if you are setting policies based on security only, or if you need to really lock systems down.

AD authentication is buggy and not very effective. Sometimes the policies are applied immediately, sometimes after 5 minutes. The only sure way to filter is to set static IPs, which is not effective network management. Many websites are not filtered. Many categories don't include commonly used sites. Malware can slip through easily.

For the functionality, the price is fair. Easy to manage and simple to deploy if you are using basic features. Tech support is not very helpful. I have suggested numerous changes that could be made, but nobody responded.

• SSL Inspection
• Ability to send decrypted traffic to other security solutions for inspection.

It allowed us to analyze the decrypted SSL web traffic for malware.

Security of browsing.

Seven years.

Yes. When we first began working with it, the product was not mature and we had performance issues.

Now, the product is quite stable.

No.

Customer Service:

Good, because we have a MCS (mission critical support) level.

Technical Support:

Good, especially for the second line.

No.

It was complex with a lot of technical issues.

We implemented it with a skilled vendor team.

Not applicable.

It is quite expensive.

Yes, Blue Coat and McAfee.

Email web and DLP

Organisation of emails

Support

1 year

No.

Yea, loads of issues.

Customer Service:

2 out of 10

Technical Support:

6 out of 10

Yea Bluecoat, Websense has more features.

Straight forward

Vendor - 8 out of 10

Better

I expect timely support....