Barracuda ESG (discontinued) vs. Mimecast Advanced Email Security

Good combination when using their other products like an incident response. When using automated workflows, this makes creating sender policies a breeze. Unfortunately, this can also be done too well as it may filter out valid emails and to resend or place them back into users' mailbox isn't an easy thing to do even if you attempt to resend through the Email Security Gateway.

If you are looking for something easy to use, easy to set up, and easy to maintain, Mimecast Advanced Email Security fits the bill. From end to end, its simplicity makes it a great fit for both tech oriented companies as well as companies with a less technically inclined users. If you can navigate an email inbox, you can utilize Mimecast Advanced Email Security on the user side.

Incentivized

• ESS has a simple interface for both users and administrators.
• The "Manage Quarantine" button in each email is a direct sign-on link, so users don't have to remember their password to manage their quarantine (this is GOLD, Jerry!).
• The baseline functionality (catching spam/malware/phishing/malware attachments/malformed PDFs etc) is super-solid, with few false positives and few false negatives.

Incentivized

• URL Scanning to prevent malicious links from being opened.
• Notifies users of emails that have been blocked and gives them some self-serve options to allow or block them pending certain criteria.
• Very easy to use interface for admin management.
• Uptime of their system has been phenomenal.

Incentivized

• You need to take time in adding your contacts to a whitelist so that you don't miss an email.
• I recommend changing the time interval; Barracuda notifies you that you have quarantined emails as we were only getting 1 per day and we missed some urgent emails.
• The quarantine folder is web based, we'd prefer it to have been an add-in for Outlook.

Incentivized

• I would like to see some additional improvement around the attachment protection, specifically what may be getting caught and what types of files are attempting to be delivered via email by impersonators.
• The Targeted Threat Protection is a great product, and I wish there was a dashboard for this service where we could easily see the types of emails and/or links that have been caught as part of the protection module that could be shared with executives.
• Finally, I feel that the phishing protection is great and honestly don't believe there should be much improvement needed there.

Incentivized

I gave a 9/10 rating because with the 1 limited resources needs a bit of experience to work on the dashboard, and then Strong protection policies, reliable email continuity and proactive threat intelligence.

Incentivized

Setting up the Barracuda for use with Microsoft 365 provides issues that Barracuda seems to have no fix for. I mentioned these issues to their support, because I am constantly reminded of them by their system, and I was told that those errors are normal for our setup and to ignore them which is frustrating to me.

Incentivized

The product overall is easy to set up and use; there have been no problems on our end with configuring any policies and getting them to work as expected. All email management can be contained in a single console and is accessible for any required diagnosis. When we've had issues we're unsure about, the support team has always been very prompt and helpful in resolving and finding the cause.

Incentivized

Availability is robust and flawless. This is a non-issue, its always up & running and fail-over protection is available for restarts or upgrades.

Incentivized

Overall, it's very good, but I do remember a few times in the past year we have seen some availability issues.

Incentivized

The WebUI is the only piece I find lacking on the Barracuda ESK. Its is not the fastest and is fairly utilitarian in its approach. The Outlook plug-in, while not in wide use here, causes zero slowdown in Outlook or the Barracuda ESG.

Incentivized

Pages need to consistently load quickly. Sometimes good, sometimes not.

Incentivized

Barracuda Email Security Gateway support is great at responding and escalating cases when needed. Timeliness is key when dealing with email attacks, spoofing or malware. Barracuda also has great resources for end-user training as our end users are our first line of defense in combatting attacks on our company. Training end-users pays off in time spent dealing with any email attacks

Incentivized

When calling them you get best in the world customer services but as previously mentioned their online community and capabilities are a bit lacking. They want you to log into their portal to see updates on issues (vs. using a public facing service) and I rarely find the answers to my issues in electronic format. Their online presence is only helpful with the simplest of issues.

Incentivized

We did not have in-person training. All was done through meetings and on phone.

Incentivized

Training was good from Mimecast as well as the Mimecast knowledgebase.

Incentivized

Easy to set up and configure, but did have Mimecast assistance.

Incentivized

Barracuda integrates well with Office 365 and mail flow is great. It was the first solution we found that was part of a greater suite to fit all the requirements we had. With the Email Security gateway being in the cloud, it required no extra hardware but also nothing new installed on an endpoint as some solutions require.

Incentivized

Proofpoint ATP offered strong threat detection and forensics, but it was more complex to manage and significantly more expensive. Microsoft 365 Defender had solid native integration with M365, but its filtering and impersonation protection weren’t as strong out of the box, requiring additional tuning. Abnormal Security excelled in AI-driven behavioral analysis, but it lacked some of the email continuity and DLP features we needed. Mimecast stood out for its robust phishing protection, easy policy management, and seamless integration with our SOC and firewall tools while keeping costs manageable.

Incentivized

The solution continues to grow and add features.

Incentivized

Professional services for our setup was excellent, quick and knowledgeable.

Incentivized

• The gateway learns current scam which can prevent unmeasureable damage. As a government organization attacks on our network affect public safety.
• Previous gateways I have managed have required significant amounts of time grooming. The Barracuda gateway has freed up a great deal of my time due to its intelligence and intent scanning.
• I have very few incidences where a legitimate malicious email will pass through the filter. Just one of these emails can wreak havoc on an organization.

Incentivized

• Saves Time for C-Suite blocking unwanted Mails & Spam.
• Saves time for Admins using message tracking, can go back 30 days, and EOL mail trace takes a lot longer to run.
• Allows staff to send & Receive large files securely, saving time for IT teams having to move large amounts of data across networks or sending via other means (FTP, File transfer sites, etc), Reducing the Risk of lost data via file sharing platforms such as Dropbox, etc.

Incentivized