Forcepoint Secure Web Gateway Reviews

We are a professional services company and I use this solution in my office, but I also implement it for some of my customers. This product is used as a security gateway, and more generally, as part of an internet security solution.

I have some customers who have deployed this solution on-premises, while others have a hybrid cloud deployment using Azure or AWS.

I can now go to sleep not being bothered of users accessing sites that are wasteful or can compromise security.

The most valuable feature is the categorization, where you can allow general access to an application but limit specific features. For example, you can allow a user to access Facebook, yet restrict their ability to stream Facebook videos or download pictures. The same thing can be done on services like YouTube. A similar example is that of online storage solutions, where you can approve storage collaboration with Office 365 SharePoint, but limit them from using OneDrive or Box.

I really like the fact that you aren't required to get a Forcepoint appliance. It can be deployed on a VM and I am happy to have my own servers.

Forcepoint integrates well with other appliances.

The deployment is a bit complex and it requires expertise to deploy, which is something that should be improved and made easier to do.

I have been working with Forcepoint Web Security for approximately three years. 

We have not had any problems with the stability of Forcepoint.

I have been in contact with technical support and they are great. Every time I call for assistance, they always help. Whether it is weekdays or weekends, if I need a technical session or I request materials or ask them to guide me through something, they've always been very helpful. If you have a pending case then they call you to give you updates and see what else can be done to resolve the problem. They don't allow you to just hunt down issues on your own. Rather, they will help and you are assured that they will work with you.

This is the kind of assurance that we give to our customers or anybody else who is looking into implementing Forcepoint. Especially in my region, I am very confident with the helpfulness and capability of the support, no matter who the customer is.

I am a reseller for many different types of security solutions, and I have a preference in favor of Forcepoint. There are downsides to other solutions that I have not encountered with Forcepoint, and moreover, the support in my region is massive.

The deployment is a bit complex. If you have all of the prerequisites and know all of the sites then the deployment can be done in a few days or a week. It's very rare not to encounter issues because customers will make requests, and you get stuck because of the different environments. You have to contact the customer to figure out how to resolve problems, and it can be time-consuming. The important thing is to have the planning done before starting the implementation.

The simple part of the deployment is the installation on the VM. You just have to get the license, visit the support portal, download the image, and install it on the virtual machine. When deploying on the cloud, you just have to make sure that you have space in Azure.

We have an in-house team to handle deployment.

The Prices are fair and you are assured of getting the value for your money.

Forcepoint looks ahead at what is needed and they seem to be on track. Two years ago, they knew what they would be doing in 2020, and they are on the right path.

I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.

On-premises

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.