Bitdefender GravityZone vs. Carbon Black App Control

Bitdefender had been a great replacement for our previous product - it was painless to make the switch with very few issues. We tested in a VM lab a few different offerings, but Bitdefender was the one that covered everything we required at the time and allowed us to be able to expand the offering simply.

Incentivized

Cb Protect is best suited somewhere where you want to maximize the lockdown of workstations. So moving past no local admin rights to blocking specific applications and peripherals. The idea would be to have a list of applications you want to run, and then anything else is not able to be used. As stated prior, if you have a very fluid environment where you are having all sorts of new applications installed frequently (I feel for you!!) this is still do-able, but it misses the general idea. I think especially in environments that are more sensitive to new applications, like banks, healthcare systems etc, this is a good fit. The ability to look at application levels, drift, unapproved software etc is very useful.

Incentivized

• Once installed, Bitdefender [GravityZone] runs silently in the background with little to no need for user interaction.
• The cloud-based console provides for easy computer management and deployment.
• Bitdefender [GravityZone] is extremely flexible, with a policy-based system wherein different profiles can be created (i.e. a policy to deactivate the firewall, a policy to allow for admin control on a machine, etc.) and pushed out to individual computers.
• Computers can be grouped into different categories, with different policies automatically deployed to each category.
• Bitdefender [GravityZone] is relatively resource-light and runs well even on lower-end computers.

Incentivized

• Controls file writes, executions of the scripts
• Defends from process injections, memory protection
• Visibility and lock down posibilities

Incentivized

• Who do I ask? This is my chief complaint is once the initial licenses were purchased through Bit Defender, there was no one to contact that could help navigate some of the initial questions I had with regard to specific policies to implement for our file server. The parent web site is, well, hard to navigate when one is trying to "learn" the system.
• The second issue is in increasing the licenses. It took several days for the parent company (by contact and phone) to inform me that they could not increase the licenses and I would have to go through a private vendor. There was no intent to connect me to a vendor or provide a vendor list until I asked specifically. YET I continue to get email from the parent company reminding me to pay an annual fee for the licenses purchase through the private vendor. The parent company can see the number of licenses yet did not sell them to me.
• Gravity Zone Dashboard, while excellent for those who have experience, is not particularly intuitive for those who have never used it. There does not seem to be a lot of documentation for those responsible for implementation.

Incentivized

• Perhaps more specific training.

Incentivized

It works. I rely heavily on my vendors to provide a product that works, is easy to implement, and that they support. As well as be a decent value for the money

Incentivized

On the whole I find the product very easy to use but some features need me to do some digging about in the console menus to find everything. I think if the interface used a bit less jargon and more clear plain language, it would be easier to find how to do things within the console.

Incentivized

Yes its very available. The software continues to protect you even if you are offline. It constantly runs in the background and will check for updates again once back online.

Incentivized

The console is quite fast and responsive, and once you start to get used to it, it is easy to use and you can see the main dashboard status at a glance. You can then dig deeper into the individual Companies / Endpoint clients and check the status of each. The software itself is not heavy on system resources in each PC.

Incentivized

Support is an area Bitdefender has always struggled with. While their products work great, the GravityZone dashboard is very technical in nature. If you aren't IT inclined, it could be difficult to setup. While most times support is helpful, we tend to work with them over email because of their very thick accent, they are hard to understand over the phone.

Incentivized

The trainer went through everything in the console an showed me what each setting did. If I had any questions on how to do something, he showed me where to go and how to do it. The trainer was very helpful and knowledgeable, and also professional and patient. Highly recommended.

Incentivized

The trainer went through everything in the console an showed me what each setting did. If I had any questions on how to do something, he showed me where to go and how to do it. The trainer was very helpful and knowledgeable, and also professional and patient. Highly recommended.

Incentivized

We were a Kaspersky shop for years. Kaspersky was a resource hog and it didn't even block half of what was thrown at it. We had more outbreaks and more end-user complaints in a year of Kaspersky then we have had in almost three years of Bitdefender.

Incentivized

The big difference between Protect and Barkly/AMP is how exactly it goes about what it's doing. Protect is application whitelisting and program reputation. So the way it's protecting you is using a proprietary reputation service, and hash values to identify applications, and then hitting a list of whitelisted programs to decide if you are able to run that or not, based on the policy you are in. There is a LOT of value in that. We actually are working on transitioning to Cisco Advanced Malware Protection (AMP). The main reason is cost (about the same cost as Cb Protect, but with (most of) the featureset of all 3 Carbon Black products for less than 1/3 of the total spend. AMP works differently, looking at a reputation service powered by Cisco's Talos cloud. You don't really have application whitelisting, but that also reduces how many "requests" you get for applications. So I'll have to find a different way to do whitelisting and USB blocking and the like, but I'm getting more visibility across my network and also built in antivirus (TETRA engine - ClamAV with some work). Barkly is an add that we are looking to put in as it looks at behavior of programs. So specifically it watches for privilege elevation and the like. Thus far all the big name problem children (WannaCry, other ransomware problems) have been caught natively in Barkly day 0.

Incentivized

I give it this rating because one you have the console running, you can add or remove whole companies, add computer endpoints (and remove them), and easily create and deploy endpoint packages to the machines that need the software. Once installed, the software starts to report back to the Bitdefender servers and the number of active licences is then seen and billed.

Incentivized

• The ROI for Bitdefender is hard to quantify except that it requires very little maintenance time from our staff.
• We've spent no time troubleshooting user complaints or issues from users, so it has been a big time-saver over our previously used anti-malware software.
• Bitdefender's customer service is usually pretty good and also very responsive, so I don't have to wait by the phone or to keep checking email to resolve a problem--although our issues have been mostly informational and not a problem with functionality.

Incentivized

• App Control can ensure Continuous Compliance.
• Solution can reduce expenses on different security software.
• Nowadays Zero Trust approach is very important for any organization and Application control is one of the main parts of it.

Incentivized