Barracuda Web Security Gateway vs. xonPlus vs. Zscaler Internet Access

Barracuda Web Security Gateway is a secure solution. This solution offers advanced filtering for web content, application control, access control, network monitoring, and user authentication to control network access. It is easy to use, helps prevent access to harmful content. Therefore, I highly recommend the Barracuda Web Security Gateway to enhance your network security, secure remote administration, and approve and control application usage.

Incentivized

It has been pretty great in our deployment; the ability to send specific messages to users, or to isolate with a banner, has given us more control without blunt "this was blocked for this reason" landing pages. We have a lot of YouTube use, and it's difficult to police the legitimate use from personal use. Because of this, the quotas have been an effective way to achieve traffic goals without getting in users' way.

Incentivized

• It can integrate with active directory to place restrictions based on a specific user or group if required - or alternatively to allow a user/group to access more on the web if needed.
• The application blocking features have been especially useful in our enterprise, and there is a large number of applications & web applications available to block/allow as needed.

Incentivized

• Provides a secure VPN connection point for endpoint connectivity.
• Provides the VPN connectivity in a fast and reliable connection state.
• Very dependable, once connected the connection stays up and there's no fuss.
• Very good at letting you know when you are not authenticated.
• Very easy to authenticate and regain access when your session times out.

Incentivized

• There are 2 different policies; authenticated and unauthenticated. Sometimes the filter does not pick up the user that is logged in. When this happens, that user could potentially access sites that would normally be blocked.
• Sometimes blocking one thing could block something you need. We had an instance where we use remote software. We block BitTorrent but for some reason, the filter was seeing this remote software as BitTorrent traffic. I got support on the line and we were eventually able to figure out a solution.
• We put in certain applications. One of them is supposed to be blocked but a lot of the time it doesn't get blocked.

Incentivized

• ZS CLI support to turn off ZIA and ZDX service specifically on mac.
• Better visibility into failed posture devices, including a timeline and the reason the posture failed (This is about the Zscaler mobile portal: Enrolled devices --> Failed posture devices).

Incentivized

While Zscaler Internet Access (ZIA) delivers critical value in cloud security and RBI compliance, I rate renewal likelihood 7/10 due to evolving needs versus platform limitations. Below is my rationale:

Key Gaps:

1. Advanced Threat Costs:

ZIA’s add-ons (e.g., Advanced DLP, Sandboxing) incur 35%+ cost premiums – straining budgets as transaction volumes (UPI/iMobile) grow 50% YoY.

2. API Banking Scalability:

ZIA’s API rate limits throttle real-time policy sync during UPI peaks (10K+ TPS), forcing workarounds for finacle integrations.

3. RBI Future-Proofing:

Limited native support for upcoming digital rupee (CBDC) security rules requires custom development, increasing compliance overhead.

Incentivized

There are a lot of settings you can adjust. The web log is easy to use. If a user is having issues accessing a website, you can go in and see what's being blocked and why. After that, you can make adjustments fairly easy. The GUI is easy to navigate and updating the software is a simple click of a button.

Incentivized

The product is as expected. ZIA has been integrated and utilized as intended. Any modifications to rules in ZCC have been straightforward to implement. Although it has not been done yet, the segmentation for specific users is highly anticipated. The product received a 9, as no product is wholly perfect, but it has been great to use.

Incentivized

There are often performance issues reported

Incentivized

Barracuda support is always available, 24/7. They are always friendly, supportive, and follow-up with anything they promise. Any ticket that is opened is touched constantly by the support team until it is remedied

Zscaler's ZIA support is quick and knowledgable. They respond within 1-2 hours of you submitting your ticket. They are very thorough and are typically ready to jump on a live troubleshooting session. Our ZIA platform and how we use is it unique so at times tickets can be open for weeks but we alway get quality support compared to other unrelated product support in our enterprise

Incentivized

good the engineer give excellent support and eplanation

Incentivized

Barracuda Web Filter is superior to the built-in content filters of any firewalls (even next gen) that we have encountered. It's a misconception that the built-in filtering on a SonicWALL or WatchGuard is enough. I don't believe that Barracuda has any direct competitors in this space that it's not head and shoulders above.

We keep using the other products, but for network traffic Zscaler Internet Access tends to be the best solution, although for Infoblox we are using their DNS solution, and for CrowdStrike, we are focusing on other items more related to EDR than network.

Incentivized

• We had several of our divisions that we thought needed to increase their internet bandwidth, due to decreased speed and productivity. After installing the Barracuda Web Security Gateway, we realized we had some abusive behavior going on with online activity. We set some controls and the bandwidth usage decreased by at least 30%, allowing us to maintain the current bandwidth and not spending more money.

• I would say it has a very good ROI, as whenever someone can't access something, they submit a ticket to our network engineer, and within minutes, the site is safely added to ZIA with best-practice configurations. After seeing a little of the UI from the Zenith event, it seems very user-friendly to control these policies.

Incentivized