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SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)

Overview

What is SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)?

SolarWinds LEM is security information and event management (SIEM) software.

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Recent Reviews

TrustRadius Insights

Easy Configuration Process: Many users have expressed their positive experiences with the configuration process of SolarWinds, noting that …
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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

Popular Features

View all 7 features
  • Centralized event and log data collection (17)
    8.5
    85%
  • Deployment flexibility (17)
    7.9
    79%
  • Event and log normalization/management (17)
    7.3
    73%
  • Custom dashboards and workspaces (16)
    4.9
    49%
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Pricing

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What is SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)?

SolarWinds LEM is security information and event management (SIEM) software.

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee
For the latest information on pricing, visithttps://www.solarwinds.com/products/pri…

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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Alternatives Pricing

What is Microsoft Sentinel?

Microsoft Sentinel (formerly Azure Sentinel) is designed as a birds-eye view across the enterprise. It is presented as a security information and event management (SIEM) solution for proactive threat detection, investigation, and response.

What is Sumo Logic?

Sumo Logic is a log management offering from the San Francisco based company of the same name.

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Features

Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)

Security Information and Event Management is a category of security software that allows security analysts to look at a more comprehensive view of security logs and events than would be possible by looking at the log files of individual, point security tools

7.7
Avg 7.8
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Product Details

What is SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)?

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (previously know as Log & Event Manager) is presented by the vendor as a powerful and award-winning SIEM. It is an on-prem deployed tool that collects, consolidates, and analyzes logs and events from firewalls, IDS/IPS devices and applications, switches, routers, servers, operating system logs, and other applications.

The main applications are threat detection, automated incident analysis and response, and compliance reporting for IT infrastructure.

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) Features

Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) Features

  • Supported: Centralized event and log data collection
  • Supported: Correlation
  • Supported: Event and log normalization/management
  • Supported: Deployment flexibility
  • Supported: Integration with Identity and Access Management Tools
  • Supported: Custom dashboards and workspaces

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) Screenshots

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SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) Video

Security Event Manager - Overview

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) Technical Details

Deployment TypesOn-premise
Operating SystemsWindows
Mobile ApplicationNo

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) Downloadables

Frequently Asked Questions

SolarWinds LEM is security information and event management (SIEM) software.

Splunk Enterprise Security (ES), LogRhythm NextGen SIEM Platform, and ManageEngine EventLog Analyzer are common alternatives for SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM).

Reviewers rate Host and network-based intrusion detection highest, with a score of 10.

The most common users of SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) are from Mid-sized Companies (51-1,000 employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(119)

Community Insights

TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!

Easy Configuration Process: Many users have expressed their positive experiences with the configuration process of SolarWinds, noting that it is easy and straightforward. This indicates that the product provides a user-friendly interface for making necessary adjustments, making it convenient for users to set up and customize according to their needs.

Excellent Customer Support: Several reviewers have praised the expertise and effectiveness of SolarWinds' customer support team in resolving issues. They have found the assistance provided by the support team to be valuable in addressing any concerns or difficulties they encountered while using the product.

Efficient Log Collection and Normalization: Users appreciate the centralized log collection and normalization feature offered by SolarWinds. This functionality streamlines the monitoring and analysis process by efficiently collecting logs from various sources and normalizing them into a consistent format. This allows for easier management and analysis of log data, saving users time and effort.

Confusing User Interface: Users have expressed dissatisfaction with the confusing user interface of SolarWinds SEM, which has made tasks difficult to accomplish. Many reviewers have specifically mentioned that they struggled to navigate and understand the UI.

Limited Reporting Capabilities: Users have found the reporting capabilities of SEM to be limited and not intuitive. They have suggested the need for a better report generation tool that offers more flexibility and customization options.

Poor Integration with Other Products: Several users desired better integration between SEM and other products in the SolarWinds line, such as NPM. They mentioned difficulties in achieving seamless integration, which hindered their ability to effectively manage their network infrastructure.

Users have provided several recommendations based on their experiences with SolarWinds Security Event Manager. The three most common recommendations are:

  1. It is important to have a detailed plan before deploying the tool. This will help meet expectations and ensure effective usage.

  2. Users highly recommend SolarWinds Security Event Manager as a reliable security solution. It provides comprehensive log monitoring and is particularly useful for tracking equipment, communication lines, and backup programming.

  3. Before making a decision, users suggest evaluating whether SolarWinds Security Event Manager meets the specific requirements of your company. Consider factors such as company size, data protection needs, scalability, user intuitiveness, ease of installation, and cost-effectiveness.

It's worth noting that while some users find the software easy to use and understand, others mention concerns about its pricing and suggest exploring alternative options like PRTG or OpManager.

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-25 of 45)
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Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • quickly find top logon failure user, which is suspect of malware infection
  • easily find most visited port on the routers to find possible attack
  • SEM traffic type sort report is useful tool to control unnecessary network usage
  • wish SEM could update by itself
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • Make sense of syslog entries from a variety of sources
  • Tarck USB device usage
  • Track login attempts, successes and failures
  • Easier custom reporting
  • Automate alerts when certain thresholds are met
  • Easier rule writing
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • Logging network devices and servers
  • Searching Historical Events
  • Notifications and custom rules
  • Sometimes get duplicate log entries for the same event
  • There is a moderate learning curve for setup and maintenance
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • Categorizing of events in different buckets: Security, IT Operations, Change Management, Authentication, Endpoint Monitoring, Compliance.
  • Intuitive configuration via Wizards, with meaningful examples and interactive help.
  • The ability to create rules and set up actions for select events, using predefined templates.
  • Better integration with npm, rather than being a standalone product.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • Process Syslog/trap and event messages
  • Provides an easily understood dashboard
  • easily processes events from agent and non-agent devices
  • Reporting uses Crystal Reports which is very limited and not intuitive
  • Process for building custom filters needs more in-context help tools
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • Log collection
  • User-friendly and Easy dashboards
  • Queries seeped (according to our size)
  • log data parsing is good. if you upgrade some systems, most likely SEM will recognize it
  • Agent installations are easy but there are some meaningless steps
  • Can be add an advanced reporting process or module
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • Customizable event filters
  • Awesome user interface
  • Easy to configure connectors
  • Needs better integration with SolarWinds NPM. This is the only Solarwinds product we use that isn't integrated.
  • It needs a more lightweight client.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • SOC Dashboard
  • Compliance Reporting
  • Node Health
  • User Logon Events Dashboard
  • Poor Performance for 10,000+ elements
  • Poor Performance for real-time dashboard when over 10K nodes
  • Poor database performance for extra large global enterprise
Score 1 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • It gives you [the] ability to see logs in one central location
  • Inbuilt rules and filters
  • How to build custom [rules] for individual purposes (e.g. rules for Admin users on critical systems, log on, log off, brute force, scanning)
  • Customer support should be timely and available
  • Videos to onboarding systems should be made ( e.g, websites, servers, wireless access point, active directories, firewalls, Domain controls, etc)
  • Hard to achieve unwanted logs
  • Updates for SEM users should be made available (New features and usability)
  • No user-friendly support
  • No health check of the SEM by Solarwinds
  • Support needs to improve
  • Videos to be sent to users on how to create custom rules to fit individual purposes
  • Training on each feature of the SEM tool should be made available in a specific location on SolarWinds website
  • Best practice videos and use cases should be made available
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • Easy to utilize--the rules are straightforward and pre-configured. You just have to customize them to fit your environment.
  • Great customer service, which is incredibly useful when you want help with better utilizing the SEM.
  • Easy and clear filters when looking for specific information without your environment.
  • The SEM can be rather slow--an increase in CPU and RAM appeared to fix this problem fairly easily though.
  • The SEM has lately required reboots for us fairly often. This is something we are currently working with support to resolve.
  • The SEM could release additional graphic options to help better display data to management.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • Has a nice user-friendly interface. Some SIEM can be daunting to learn how to use and get acclimated to, but LEM has an intuitive layout and is very easy to pick up and use.
  • The logging agent in the source device is really simple to deploy and integrate.
  • Monitoring and reporting the account disablement with detail to whoever disabled an account for audit and compliance.
  • Some logs are not parsed well, happen to depend on the external log parser tool.
  • The update method needs to be made even simpler, auto update would be better.
  • The email alert features with SolarWinds will send a large number of emails if the number of alerts email. The duplication of email alerting needs to be reduced.
Joseph Crook | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • We use the client on register systems as event forwarders and log collection.
  • It enables us to verify the access security to high value workstations and register systems.
  • It provides a repository storage for log files so that they do not solely exist on workstations.
  • It helps us ensure PCI standards are being maintained and track security risk issues as well as system health.
  • Within the scope of my role I have noticed that the client can be problematic during system startup - some of the register systems we use are older and have lower resolution screens. When the client loads it pops up on screen but completely out of scale (to clarify, it may open a window that is 14x14 inches on a screen that only displays 10x10 inches. This is more frustration than a functional problem.
  • Automated rollout would be useful but it is outside of my scope in my job to even know if it already has automated install capability.
  • The GUI itself is a little clunky and there is somewhat of a learning curve - training is provided to clients however a friendlier interface would be helpful.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • Easy to install virtual appliance
  • Out of the box configuration that works with little modification
  • Price isn't based on events it's based on monitored nodes
  • It may not scale to millions of nodes
  • Searches way back in time take a little longer due to compression
  • Not many Cons really!
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • Graphs showing important events
  • First-time setup and addition of new devices is easy and organized
  • Performance is excellent
  • Reporting could allow for more customization
  • Better integration with other products of SolarWinds line
  • More alert options
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
  • Brings together security events from multiple system sources.
  • Allows IT to review and manage security related events.
  • Provides convenient filters/views allowing us to narrow down the data we want to see.
  • Some improvements in user documentation could be helpful.
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