NordLayer vs. Zscaler Private Access

NordLayer has become an invaluable resource for our security posture and day-to-day activity. The primary use case is preventing staff members from accessing sensitive resources on an unencrypted connection, applying NordLayer and conditional access policies in congruency. The ability to create teams and assigned them to specific dedicated servers is also helpful and allows for further security segmentation

Incentivized

Zscaler Private Access works really well in environments setup for FQDNs and where you know what users should/shouldn't be accessing on what ports. You can use Zscaler Private Access to figure out these kinds of features but that doesn't always mean you'll be correct. It also provides a consistent experience for users as they can access their materials anywhere. It also makes the user the last line of defense. If a user's account is compromised then the attacker has access to everything they already did. It doesn't work great in OT environments or Server based environments. Flows have to be initiated from the client and not the server for stuff to behave properly.

Incentivized

• Easy to use
• Simple user interface desgin
• Support many VPN protocol
• Fast and reliable connection

Incentivized

• Connecting users remotely with a secure connection. I am a service desk agent who works with end users, and if there is an issue due to ZPA, it's most likely due to configuration. A really good service.
• Logging, I believe, works well as I troubleshoot end users and can gather extra details for my network admin. IP.zscaler.com, and the debug logs are nice. Additionally, I like how it shows the App policy assigned to the user's machine ECT.

Incentivized

• The browser plugin needs some work, or some research about what browser/OS restrictions may limit its functionality. Ours does not work at all even after contacting support so we do not use it
• Toast/Windows notifications scheduled or deployed through admin center would be amazing. The ability to remind a user who has been disconnected for X hours would be a great feature

Incentivized

• Needs an interface for Support Desk/Help Desk to more easily understand that the problem is a lack of an FQDN or access is not allowed due to policy, not because of a technical shortcoming in ZPA.
• Documentation of the BC solution is not well-detailed.

Incentivized

When it works - it works incredibly slick. It's only L4 which seems like a downgrade of security from solutions that promote L7.

Incentivized

The environment feels more secure, and we are seeing that users are adapting to it fast. The fact that we have tools to assist the users with their day-to-day access helps, as we can hand it off to the helpdesk without any escalations to the Network team. It is a work in progress for our agency, but we are seeing the benefits from the solution.

Incentivized

easy configuration and use case

ZPA is where the bulk of zero-trust access is found. While the functionality for ZIA is excellent, the policy we implement for internet access is more focused on threat prevention and not narrowly scoped access.

Incentivized

• Improved sercurity
• Incresed productivity
• Performance impact

Incentivized

• We used to get anywhere from 30 to 50 tickets surrounding our previous VPN solution every month. We now average 3-5 tickets regarding remote connectivity, and of those, only 1 or 2 are actual issues with ZPA.
• Using ZPA Access Policies, we can now block endpoints that have outdated security software from ever connecting to our environment. This was simply not possible with our previous solution.
• Some of our employee base skews older and had a harder time understanding the change from VPN to Zscaler.
• There is significantly less downtime with ZPA when compared to other VPN solutions.

Incentivized