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Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software vs. Sophos Web Content Filtering

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software

    Score9 out of 10
    N/ACisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) software is the core OS for the ASA suite. It provides firewall functionality, as well as integration with context-specific Cisco security modules. It is scaled for enterprise-level traffic and connections.N/A

    Sophos Web Content Filtering

    Score8.9 out of 10
    N/AUK headquartered Sophos offers web content filtering.N/A
    Pricing
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareSophos Web Content Filtering
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareSophos Web Content Filtering
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareSophos Web Content Filtering
    Considered Both Products
    Cisco
    No answer on this topic
    Sophos
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    87%
    Would buy again
    40 Answers
    100%
    Would buy again
    6 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    95%
    Delivers good value for the price
    42 Answers
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    5 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    91%
    Happy with the feature set
    42 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    6 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    36 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    98%
    Implementation went as expected
    41 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Features
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareSophos Web Content Filtering
    Firewall
    Comparison of Firewall features of Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software and Sophos Web Content Filtering
    Feature
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    8.9
    50 Ratings
    4% above category average
    Sophos Web Content Filtering
    -
    Ratings
    Identification Technologies7.932 Ratings00 Ratings
    Visualization Tools7.931 Ratings00 Ratings
    Content Inspection8.433 Ratings00 Ratings
    Policy-based Controls8.446 Ratings00 Ratings
    Active Directory and LDAP8.448 Ratings00 Ratings
    Firewall Management Console9.049 Ratings00 Ratings
    Reporting and Logging8.949 Ratings00 Ratings
    VPN10.049 Ratings00 Ratings
    High Availability9.649 Ratings00 Ratings
    Stateful Inspection10.046 Ratings00 Ratings
    Proxy Server9.032 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareSophos Web Content Filtering
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    SonicWall NSA Series
    Score8.3 out of 10
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    Medium-sized Companies
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    Score9.6 out of 10
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    Enterprises
    F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)
    Score8.8 out of 10
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    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareSophos Web Content Filtering
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.0
    (88 ratings)
    9.0
    (7 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    7.1
    (4 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Availability
    7.5
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    8.7
    (8 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    8.0
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    6.5
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareSophos Web Content Filtering
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Cisco
    Cisco ASA's are great for internal network connected access between a firewall and the central management server. And, for complex networks where high security requirements with overly strict compliance are necessary. For networks with limited connectivity to the core or for poor network connectivity these are not the best solution. There are other more stand-alone firewall's that do this better. These firewall's are a little more complex to set up to start with so significant knowledge of these devices is required to set them up and ensure they are best practice installed.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sophos
    Before Sophos, I would receive scammers regarding tradeshow lists. People wanted me to pay for lists, but these people weren't actually from the tradeshows. I can now block those, and have received much fewer of those scams. I am also able to open emails within quarantine to view them before deleting, releasing, allowing, or blocking. I use this to my advantage, and am able to make better decisions on what to do with the emails.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Cisco
    • ASA is our VPN concentrator. The client and server are very stable and very easy to use
    • ASA also offers Intrusion Prevention, to an extent. This is also very useful for an improved security posture for a small company
    • ASA allowed us to scale very quickly. We could onboard clients, partners, and consultants and give them a great onboarding experience as well
    • Administrative costs with ASA are low. It's very easy to administer.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sophos
    • Sophos does an excellent job of category-based content filtering. It's easy to configure and flexible for many environments with the ability to tighten or loosen restrictions as requirements determing.
    • Sophos' built-in capabilites can force safe search rules to protect against content work-arounds like Image search and search engines in general.
    • The Sophos XTreme architecture also helps improve the overall performance of the Web Content Filtering solution. It is very quick and very transparent when in use on the network.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Cisco
    • The ASDM software is at times a nightmare to install because of different java versions[.]
    • [The firewall] could do with a power button, just to be able to do a hard reboot when needed[.]
    • It would be nice to manage the firewall via the web on port 443[.]
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sophos
    • It only allows UTF-8 encoded characters.
    • It does not support metadata.
    • It does not support comments in the custom filter file.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Cisco
    To be honest there has been now great products out in the market compared to Cisco ASA. I beleieve Cisco has to do a lot of improvement in this area. The other defeiniete factors is the cost when it comes to renewals which is always a premium on Cisco products
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sophos
    No answers on this topic
    Reliability and Availability
    Cisco
    I generally have not noticed the outages, however since it's a machine it can malfunction, we need to implement the firewall infrastructure in such a way that it is highly available with device failure, region failure etc. Else any solution will be having the issues if they are not build with resiliency.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sophos
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    Cisco
    The support is usually very good and gets back to you very quickly. However I had some instances of when two engineers will give me wildly different answers to what I thought was a simple question. Overall however I do rate the support highly and they are generally always very good.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sophos
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation Rating
    Cisco
    It was quite a good one, how ever requires an expertise to deploy hence the SMB segment would be finding it difficult to implement this product. The one good reason is that there are lot of ASA certified engineers in compared to the other certified engineers. Hence this resembles positively on the deployment as you have quite a lot of experienced engineer on your deployment
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sophos
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Cisco
    We were using [pfSense] before in our environment but we regularly facing difficulties over it due to software bugs & downtime. After implementing Cisco ASA, it resolved our availability issue & provides us a reliable solution with the best security features & easy to understand GUI.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sophos
    Sophos has been a much easier product to configure and eventually manage, with preset rules and policies to start off right out of the box, saving administrators time from adding every category and or site. However you can add/import all know good company sites (internal url's) as well as local sites for a safer settings. (know sites)
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Cisco
    • Most network engineers have worked with ASA, so there is no need for re-training when adding or turning over staff
    • Current configs from older devices plug in easily, and are operational on larger devices if an upgrade is required
    • Many support options available
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sophos
    • Super positive impact, the Sandstorming Add On, it increases protection at it's maximum level (for new or existent/variant threats).
    • Customers often have the need of a system capable of report everything that the network is being handed, Sophos Web Content Filtering achieves this.
    • The ROI is very fast since top management quickly see results on filtering and reporting of what is really going on within their networks.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots