We performed a comparison between CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security and Microsoft Defender for Cloud based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Features: CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security was lauded for its strong adherence to security best practices. It particularly excels in endpoint protection and its ability to leverage machine learning and AI. Microsoft Defender for Cloud stands out for its automation, threat analysis, and security coverage. CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security could improve its Kubernetes and GCP support. Microsoft Defender for Cloud could be better integrated with non-Microsoft solutions.
Service and Support: CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security users are generally content with the support team's assistance and promptness. Microsoft Defender users generally found the support team responsive and knowledgeable, but others said outsourced support lacked technical expertise and reported longer response times in certain regions.
Ease of Deployment: The setup for CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security was deemed easy, but some users struggled with the Kubernetes implementation. Setting up Microsoft Defender for Cloud is straightforward. The solution requires minimal maintenance and seamlessly integrates with other Microsoft services.
Pricing: Users consider the pricing of CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security to be fair, but it may be pricier than on-premises alternatives. Microsoft Defender for Cloud is seen as a good deal by some users, who consider it to be cost-effective, especially when bundled with other Microsoft products.
ROI: Users have provided limited feedback about the return on investment for CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security. Microsoft Defender for Cloud has demonstrated a potentially high ROI by automating tasks and improving security posture.
"The automation roles are essential because we ultimately want to do less work and automate more. The dashboards are easy to read and visually pleasing. You can understand things quickly, which makes it easy for our other teams. The network and infrastructure teams don't know as much about security as we do, so it helps to have a tool that's accessible and nice to look at."
"Out of all the features, the one item that has been most valuable is the fact that Wiz puts into context all the pieces that create an issue, and applies a particular risk evaluation that helps us prioritize when we need to address a misconfiguration, vulnerability, or any issue that would put our environment into risk."
"The solution is very user-friendly."
"The first thing that stood out was the ease of installation and the quick value we got out of the solution."
"The vulnerability management modules and the discovery and inventory are the most valuable features. Before using Wiz, it was a very manual process for both. After implementing it, we're able to get all of the analytics into a single platform that gives us visibility across all the systems in our cloud. We're able to correspond and understand what the vulnerability landscape looks like a lot faster."
"The security baseline and vulnerability assessments is the valuable feature."
"The CSPM module has been the most effective. It was easy to deploy and covered all our accounts through APIs, requiring no agents. Wiz provides instant visibility into high-level risks that we need to address."
"The product supports out-of-the-box reporting with context about the asset and allows us to perform complex custom queries on UI."
"Technical support is helpful."
"Cloud security is one valuable feature. Spotlight is the other one. There is also vulnerability management and a couple of more features."
"The RTR feature stands out as particularly valuable to me due to its capability to log into machines."
"It is fully cloud-based, so we don't need to invest in third-party agents repeatedly."
"The immediate mitigation of potential threats and instant alerts are valuable."
"Cloud security posture management (CSPM) is most valuable."
"The most significant benefit is how quickly malware and other malicious attacks are detected."
"CrowdStrike utilizes signatureless technology, eliminating the need for regular signature updates on endpoint systems."
"Most importantly, it's an integrated solution. We not only have Defender for Cloud, but we also have Defender for Endpoint, Defender for Office 365, and Defender for Identity. It's an integrated, holistic solution."
"The most valuable features are ransomware protection and access controls. The solution has helped us secure some folders on our systems from unauthorized modifications."
"It isn't a highly complex solution. It's something that a lot of analysts can use. Defender gives you a broad overview of what's happening in your environment, and it's a great solution if you're a Microsoft shop."
"The first valuable feature was the fact that it gave us a list of everything that users were surfing on the web. Having the list, we could make decisions about those sites."
"It takes very little effort to integrate it. It also gives very good visibility into what exactly is happening."
"With respect to improving our security posture, it helps us to understand where we are in terms of compliance. We can easily know when we are below the standard because of the scores it calculates."
"Defender is a robust platform for dealing with many kinds of threats. We're protected from various threats, like viruses. Attacks can be easily minimized with this solution defending our infrastructure."
"Defender lets you orchestrate the roll-out from a single pane. Using the Azure portal, you can roll it out over all the servers covered by the entire subscription."
"The remediation workflow within the Wiz could be improved."
"Given the level of visibility into all the cloud environments Wiz provides, it would be nice if they could integrate some kind of mechanism to better manage tenants on multiple platforms. For example, let's say that some servers don't have an application they need, such as an antivirus. Wiz could include an API or something to push those applications out to the servers. It would be great if you could remedy these issues directly from the Wiz platform."
"One significant issue is that the searches are case-sensitive, so finding a misconfigured resource can become very challenging."
"We're looking at some of the data compliance stuff that they've got Jon offer. I know they're looking at container security, which we gonna be looking at next."
"We wish there were a way, beyond providing visibility and automated remediation, to wait on a given remediation, due to a critical aspect, such as the cost associated with a particular upgrade... We would like to see preventive controls that can be applied through Wiz to protect against vulnerabilities that we're not going to be able to remediate immediately."
"The only small pain point has been around some of the logging integrations. Some of the complexities of the script integrations aren't supported with some of the more automated infrastructure components. So, it's not as universal. For example, they have great support for cloud formation and other services, but if you're using another type of management utility or governance language for your infrastructure-as-code automation components, it becomes a little bit trickier to navigate that."
"The reporting isn't that great. They have executive summaries, but it's only a compliance report that maps all current issues to specific controls. Whether you look at one subscription or project, regardless of the size, you will get a multipage report on how the issues in that account map to that control. Our CSO isn't going to read through that. He won't filter that out or show that to his leadership and say, "Here's what we're doing." It isn't a helpful report. They're working on it, but it's a poor executive summary."
"The solution's container security could be improved."
"The log scale or Humio side of it where it collects the data and expands into the XDR world still needs time to develop in terms of the way it combines the data and metadata that flows into the platform. I know they're working on it."
"One area for improvement in Falcon Cloud Security is the support portal."
"It would be more convenient if there was an easier way to install CrowdStrike, perhaps through better integration with Active Directory."
"The threat intelligence and user behavioral analysis could be more comprehensive."
"CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security is expensive."
"There should be cloud storage scanning. We would like to have cloud storage vulnerability and threat management on any cloud storage."
"Different file options should be available, and clients should be able to select from the options."
"The UI part needs to be improved."
"Sometimes it's very difficult to determine when I need Microsoft Defender for Cloud for a special resource group or a special kind of product."
"Consistency is the area where the most improvement is needed. For example, there are some areas where the UI is not uniform across the board."
"If a customer is already using Okta as an SSO in its entire environment, they will want to continue with it. But Security Center doesn't understand that and keeps making recommendations. It would help if it let us resolve a recommendation, even if it is not implemented."
"From my own perspective, they just need a product that is tailored to micro-segmentation so I can configure rules for multiple systems at once and manage it."
"Sometimes, it's very difficult to determine when I need Microsoft Defender for Cloud for a special resource group or certain kinds of products. That's not an issue directly with the product, though."
"Pricing could be improved. There are limited options based on pricing for the government."
"The remediation process could be improved."
"Microsoft sources most of their threat intelligence internally, but I think they should open themselves up to bodies that provide feel intelligence to build a better engine. There may be threats out there that they don't report because their team is not doing anything on that and they don't have arrangements with another party that is involved in that research."
More CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security Pricing and Cost Advice →
CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security is ranked 9th in Container Security with 13 reviews while Microsoft Defender for Cloud is ranked 3rd in Container Security with 46 reviews. CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security is rated 8.8, while Microsoft Defender for Cloud is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security writes "Enhances the overall safety of our company's environment from cyber threats". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Microsoft Defender for Cloud writes "Provides multi-cloud capability, is plug-and-play, and improves our security posture". CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security is most compared with Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, AWS GuardDuty, Qualys VMDR, Sysdig Falco and Akamai Guardicore Segmentation, whereas Microsoft Defender for Cloud is most compared with AWS GuardDuty, Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, Microsoft Defender XDR, Microsoft Defender for Endpoint and Microsoft Sentinel. See our CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud report.
See our list of best Container Security vendors, best Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) vendors, and best Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) vendors.
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