Item: F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall)
Rating: 9
Author: Verified User

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) to enhance our cybersecurity posture by protecting our web applications and APIs from various threats. The product addresses the business problem of safeguarding sensitive data and ensuring compliance with industry standards, especially GDPR since you have control over where transferred data is decrypted. By utilising the extensive feature set of F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) we have greatly improved our security posture. We ended up using F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) after evaluating some other major players in the space, include Windows Azure, Akamai and Cloudflare. F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) turned out to be the best value for money for our use case.

Pros and Cons

Malicious user mitigation detection and blocking
Advanced threat protection
Customizable security policies
Responding quickly to support requests

Some UX issues when configuring features need some getting used to
Some minor issues in the early days that support was able to resolve shortly after.

Return on Investment

Better security posture
Improved understanding of possible threats
Better traffic monitoring

App Security Simplification

We only use Cloud infrastructure so we have not utilized the integration with on-premises infrastructure, but we had discussions with the sales team that this is a feature they are really proud to offer and if at some point we need it, it is great to know that it will be available to us at no extra cost and with minimal configuration.

Distributed environments

Alternatives Considered

Cloudflare, Akamai and Imperva API Security

F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) stacks up pretty well against the competition as far as feature set is concerned and offers various tiers that make it available for limited budget projects also while offering GDPR compliance with minimum effort. Cloudflare is a much more high level solution that does not give you as fine grained control as F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall), unless you opt in for their very expensive Enterprise package, where again you have more options, but not as fine grained through their user interface.

Key Insights

Do you think F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall)'s feature set?

Yes

Did F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) again?

Yes

Other Software Used

Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), MongoDB, Microsoft SQL Server

Likelihood to Recommend

F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) is very well suited for high value web applications and APIs but also compliance driven infrastructures that might face sophisticated attacks. It is probably less appropriate for more limited applications that do not handle sensitive data. Their pricing also makes it a much more viable solution for smaller companies or workload and it also gives an inexpensive way to run it for a longer period in parallel with existing solutions in order to better evaluate if it fits your needs.

F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall) Effective and Reliable Web Application Security

Overall Satisfaction with F5 Distributed Cloud WAF (Web Application Firewall)