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Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) vs. KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)

    Score9 out of 10
    N/AThe Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) offers a network-based approach for adaptable, trusted access everywhere, based on context. It gives the user intelligent, integrated protection through intent-based policy and compliance solutions.N/A

    KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus

    Score8.7 out of 10
    N/APhishER is presented as a lightweight Security Orchestration, Automation and Response (SOAR) platform to orchestrate threat response and manage the high volume of potentially malicious email messages reported by users. And, with automatic prioritization of emails, PhishER helps InfoSec and Security Operations team cut through the inbox noise and respond to the most dangerous threats more quickly.

    $1.15

    per seat

    Pricing
    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    501-1000 Monthly Pricing 3 Year
    $1.15
    per seat
    101-500 Monthly Pricing 3 Year
    $1.50
    per seat
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details—For organizations with over 1,000 seats, contact sales for a quote.
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus
    Considered Both Products
    Cisco
    No answer on this topic
    KnowBe4
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    97%
    Would buy again
    144 Answers
    97%
    Would buy again
    125 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    97%
    Delivers good value for the price
    128 Answers
    99%
    Delivers good value for the price
    124 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    96%
    Happy with the feature set
    142 Answers
    97%
    Happy with the feature set
    125 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    93%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    99 Answers
    96%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    112 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    84%
    Implementation went as expected
    115 Answers
    95%
    Implementation went as expected
    114 Answers
    Features
    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus
    Incident Response Platforms
    Comparison of Incident Response Platforms features of Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) and KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus
    Feature
    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)
    -
    Ratings
    KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus
    8.4
    122 Ratings
    6% below category average
    Company-wide Incident Reporting00 Ratings8.3101 Ratings
    Integration with Other Security Systems00 Ratings8.597 Ratings
    Centralized Dashboard00 Ratings9.0120 Ratings
    Machine Learning to Prevent Incidents00 Ratings8.0103 Ratings
    Live Response for Rapid Remediation00 Ratings8.1102 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus
    Small Businesses
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    Medium-sized Companies
    FireMon
    Score7.9 out of 10
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    Enterprises
    Cisco IOS Security
    Score9.6 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.0
    (146 ratings)
    8.8
    (128 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    9.4
    (4 ratings)
    8.8
    (9 ratings)
    Usability
    7.9
    (6 ratings)
    8.6
    (44 ratings)
    Availability
    9.4
    (4 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Performance
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    7.3
    (7 ratings)
    8.6
    (8 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    8.4
    (4 ratings)
    8.6
    (3 ratings)
    Configurability
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.3
    (12 ratings)
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    8.4
    (2 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    7.2
    (4 ratings)
    9.1
    (2 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Professional Services
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Cisco
    Well suited... I've used it for both wired and wireless access, and it's perfect for that. In addition to enforcing security on the port, you can also lock down east-west traffic. When you get to the point where you're configuring secure group tags and things like that, you can keep people from getting to places they shouldn't. Basically, you could turn your entire network into a firewall if you wanted to. You can secure access based on the identity of any given user through role-based authentication. For example, if you have salespeople and you don't want them accessing your financial or PCI environment, they authenticate as a salesperson and you can completely stop them from getting to any of that. That's really important, especially for us. Our payment card infrastructure servers are heavily locked down. Granted, in our situation, we firewall all that off anyway, but you still don't want some random individual to be able to even attempt that sort of thing. That's what it's really good for. I'm trying to think of a weakness. I don't know. We don't really struggle with it. There's nothing that I use it for where I wish it were better, at least not that I can think of offhand. I'm sure there are things, I just can't think of anything off the top of my head.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    KnowBe4
    From an MSP perspective, it’s easier to sell products that provide cybersecurity protections if it’s all in one bundle. If you start providing 5 different email security products (even with the same vendor), it becomes confusing to non-technical individuals. They need a single package that doesn’t break the bank. Other products like Ironscales do that by providing an “all-in-one” package, essentially. And for a much less expensive price. I believe if you included all the features of anti-phishing, account takeover protection, and security awareness training, it would be close to $8/person each month. Competitors offer rates closer to $2/user, which include all those features and sometimes more.
    Incentivized
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    Pros
    Cisco
    • manageable scaled administrative access to network devices as needed
    • Great use as a radius server which allows proper authentication and authorization into the network
    • Multiple conditions that can be utilized to grant users access based on their role in the organization
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    • KnowBe4's Phish Alert Button effectively collects all reported emails from end-users in one place.
    • The PhishML feature of PhishER effectively auto-scan reported emails using machine learning technologies, providing a tag for each email based on its body content and other aspects.
    • The PhishRIP feature works well by allowing the security team to create a query and quarantine all relevant emails from the end user's email system.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Cisco
    • Trustsec needs more documentation and configuration best practice examples
    • The licensing model can be difficult to explain and understand for customers
    • Difficult to get an accurate benchmark to know exactly how many Cisco Identity Services Engine nodes and the size of the deployment should be
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    KnowBe4
    • Issues with Global Blocklist
    • Email Template Modification - Simplification
    • Target Specific Users vs. Groups
    • PhishRIP info tabs (i.e. if improperly check ripped emails are turned into tests. This has caused issues.) Info tabs or markers allow user to hover and get more information about what action a check box or slider provides.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Cisco
    We are so very reliant on Cisco Identity Services Engine at this point that finding another solution would be a big hassle for us.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    KnowBe4
    When we first discovered that KnowBe4 released something like this, we saw a demo of it and were floored at what it could do and how it could help us from a security standpoint. Gone are the days of us in IT sending out a mass email saying please don't click on anything in the email from sender "X", and it allows us to quietly and easily ensure that people don't take any action on malicious emails.
    Incentivized
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    Usability
    Cisco
    For us the solution is very easily useable on its own. Perhaps that has to do because we started using ISE in the 1.2 days and have seen it grow during the years. Policy creation, etc. is all very visible and thus easy to use. Deployment of multiple nodes is also incredibly easy and flexible. You can easily add or remove nodes as you wish.
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    It has been super easy for users to work with training and quizzes. Admin is a little difficult because you have to build the specific campaign type you want. But you can even create your own training and upload it to your LMS. This is great!!
    Incentivized
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    Reliability and Availability
    Cisco
    We do have to occasionally reboot the servers when they get low on memory, but we're also a few versions behind. Availability has generally been pretty good though with no major outages in the time that we've had it implemented.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    KnowBe4
    No answers on this topic
    Performance
    Cisco
    yes it does. depending on where you coming from. Logs are pretty busy same as report. it also depending on devices count and design.
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    Cisco
    Cisco support is second to none, both in terms of how you access support but also the knowledge of the individual support teams. If you focus on one technology and provide "manufacturer support" then you can rest assured that you are accessing Cisco's top individuals. I feel like this is a USP for Cisco support.
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    When I have a question, their were fast to respond. The downside is a that at least once I had to work through the issue with the person assigned to help me because they didn't know the answer. That said they did try and were patient. However they should have known the answer on integration.
    Incentivized
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    Online Training
    Cisco
    Training can only cover certain areas, there are a lot of areas training just can't cover. You have to learn by doing it.
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation Rating
    Cisco
    I think our system integrators lacks some competencies and this has led to an implementation that is still perfectible. (i.e. dedicating an interface for intra-cluster communication)
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    It was very simple to implement - with just a few settings needed to connect it to our O365 environment
    Incentivized
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    Alternatives Considered
    Cisco
    I think all give some visibility of device monitoring and management, but Cisco Identity Services Engine gives a good way to manage more details about the device in a centralized way that gives a wider range of monitoring and control than the other softwares individually. I don't think Cisco Identity Services Engine eliminates the need for these other software as of now, but there is potential for Cisco Identity Services Engine to be able to take over more of these roles.
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    We evaluated the Titan options because we have already used their DNS filtering product. However, KnowBe4 came in with a better price per user and a significantly stronger product lineup, particularly with its security awareness training component.
    Incentivized
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    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    Cisco
    Cisco ISE was competitively priced and Cisco was able to leverage some of our existing contracts to help ease the purchase.
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    No answers on this topic
    Scalability
    Cisco
    It's fully customised and comprehensive. only thing is you need to know what you want. Proper research and planning would save lots of time and effort .
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    No answers on this topic
    Return on Investment
    Cisco
    • I don't know about negatives because we haven't seen it right now, but positive impact is one is the roadmap we have. And now since we are going ahead with doing the deployment of Cisco ISE, we see that we are getting closure to, so at the end of the day, we have to make sure that operationally we stay excellent. So that's where operational excellence comes in. Cisco ISE is basically addressing that for us. Right now we are in a situation if there is a WIFI issue or if there is an authentication issue, it gets really difficult to isolate the problem. But with Cisco ISE , this functionality is going to come in. So we believe that it would be a good ROI.
    Incentivized
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    KnowBe4
    • There has been a 700% increase in emails being reported now. Previously, staff were only reporting 4 emails a month. It is easier for us to promote the phish alert button, receive automated remediation and rapidly respond.
    • We had no reports on the amount of phishing emails were coming through Mimecast but now we have reports for the board of trustees.
    • Every Wednesday we talk about cyber security to all staff, PhishER allows us to point out the trend and what to look out for which raises awareness. Never before were we able to talk about cyber security like this.
    Incentivized
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    ScreenShots

    Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) Screenshots

    Screenshot of Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)

    KnowBe4 PhishER/PhishER Plus Screenshots

    Screenshot of How PhishER Plus enables a critical workstream to help IR teams work together to mitigate the phishing threat and is suited for any organization that wants to automatically prioritize and manage potentially malicious messages.