Palo Alto Networks Advanced URL Filtering vs. Smoothwall SWG

Because of it's complexity, Palo may not be well suited for a small organization that may not have dedicated networking staff. But for a mid to large-sized enterprise, Palo shines.

Incentivized

Smoothwall SWG is very suitable in companies where there is a lot of staff and power to distribute the bandwidth by areas and give priority to the staff that requires better service. It's also well suited for business that require protection of their data and services as it is constantly monitoring the network and does not let them enter dangerous sites.

Incentivized

• Threat Detection and Prevention (Malwares, Un-Authorized Access)
• Out of the box patterns for threat detection
• Built in and Updated identification patterns
• Unified Dashboard/Alerting on anomaly

Incentivized

• Real-time IP filtering is very favorable. That helps limit and restrict prohibited content.
• Elaboration of personalized reports of the activities or pages that users visit to make new blocking rules to the pages most visited by users that may damage the functioning of the servers.

Incentivized

• Steep learning curve
• The top-down URL filtering match can sometimes be tricky and requires some expertise in setting up the desired policy

Incentivized

• It is necessary for them to have more material or a community that can help expand knowledge about this software so users can use 100% of their tools.

Incentivized

It is very easy to use and setup. It integrates well within all of Palo's products such as NGFWs and Prisma Access. There is a dedicated log inside of Palo products for URL filtering to aid in troubleshooting. It integrates with AD/Azure so that different users can have different URL filtering rules. Filtering can be adjusted in real-time

Incentivized

Palo support is excellent, and I have never had to wait when contacting them for support. One of the best support teams in the business, in my opinion.

Incentivized

Palo Alto Networks Advanced URL Filtering is the best solution to work with Palo Alto Firewalls and Panorama as an orchestrator. We choose Palo Alto Networks Advanced URL Filtering as it could reach the success criteria during the PoC.

Incentivized

Smoothwall SWG has many tools similar to pfSense but in my opinion I like the graphical environment of smoothwall swg more. It is more didactic and simple to use for new users. Also pfSense lacks the tools for monitoring in real time and the elaboration of reports that helps to perform statistics on sites visited.

Incentivized

• Palo has been an excellent investment for us.
• Having robust URL filtering built into the same device as the firewall saves the cost of a separate appliance and improves performance.

Incentivized

• This software helps a lot and is very economical, since it is free and it can be installed in equipment with low performance. That is of importance to companies with little budget or who are just starting out in the market.

Incentivized