Secure Access

The main use case for Cisco Secure Access  is for posture management, managing network devices, guaranteeing guest access, BYOD, guest, and sponsor portal. I have used Cisco Secure Access  from end to end.

I consider network segmentation as one of the most valuable functions of Cisco Secure Access.

I use the Zero Trust Network Access  (ZTNA ) feature of Cisco Secure Access, and we have currently deployed it for ZTNA. I appreciate the identity management of devices where they are connecting to the network. The device needs to be trusted always, which is actually a good security best practice because it does not involve trusting a device once and then allowing it network access.

I have experience with the integration of CASB  functionality in Cisco Secure Access. The cloud access broker has helped by providing a bridge between the user directory and functionality, allowing the system to enforce data control, compliance, and threat protection. This is good security practice as well.

How easy or difficult it is to manage Cisco Secure Access through the single cloud-managed console depends on who you talk to, but for me, with my experience, it has become very easy and really manageable. Much of the interface has been improved significantly, making management easier. The upgrade of the interface really has changed a lot, which makes it easier to remember.

Automation is something Cisco could improve for Cisco Secure Access. I have seen the way they have done this with SD-WAN, where you have automation of VPN through auto VPN tunneling and the creation of tunneling between SD-WAN. If Cisco could improve Cisco Secure Access in the same way, there should not be as much configuration needed, because companies are really keen when it comes to deployment these days. We need to automate deployment. If they could do that with Cisco Secure Access as well, especially with big branches, it would be great. I have worked with almost 200 branches, so configuration in all these branches is needed for security. If this could be integrated and automated exactly like the auto VPN that happens on SD-WAN, it would be excellent.

Regarding support, I do not know what happened to Cisco. I contact them, and the support has been a pain. The quality of support has dropped so drastically that it is not even funny.

I have been working with Cisco Secure Access since 2012.

Our deployment process is mixed. We are deploying for different clients, so it depends on what client they have.

Regarding support, I do not know what happened to Cisco. I contact them, and the support has been a pain. The quality of support has dropped so drastically that it is not even funny.

The setup process for Cisco Secure Access is very straightforward. Integrating with SD-WAN is really easy.

We are fighting internally with Zscaler because they are saying it is cheaper. Pricing is competitive between solutions. Palo Alto is coming very well as well. I am not sure if Cisco is also looking at that, but they are also coming with a lot of functionality within the Palo Alto space for the SASE  function.

Cisco Secure Access does help me protect my company from threats like phishing and ransomware. The fact that Cisco Secure Access integrates Zero Trust, the secure gateway, and data loss integration does a lot to help with email security because of the integration with Cisco Web Gateway. Training users is also necessary because security involves users as well.

I am satisfied with the functionality of Cisco Secure Access. One of the areas I have not investigated much time on is the integration with the segmentation within the SASE  solution. I have been doing it on my side, but I still need to understand how it integrates and how it can work instead of using the NAC solution. The ICE function could be integrated within Cisco Secure Access. I think that would be better because Cisco has integrated firewall as a service, so why not also integrate the NAC solution as a service in that platform as well.

I have given this review a rating of 9.

The two typical use cases of Cisco Secure Access  are how remote workers securely access both private applications, public applications, and SaaS applications from anywhere.

In my opinion, Cisco Secure Access  is a complete SSE solution. The second good thing about it is that it has very deep end integration with other products which are required to improve security, such as multi-factor authentication and NAC products, all coming from Cisco. Whatever the customer use case may be, not only Cisco Secure Access but other applications coming from the Cisco security product line are available without needing to look outside of that ecosystem. Typically, I can just take it from Cisco and complete the entire solution.

From my perspective, it is quite easy to manage Cisco Secure Access.

The Talos integration for threat detection and response capability is a must for any product, whether running a SIEM  or XDR . The Talos threat intelligence, which is possibly one of the largest organizations that gathers all this data and sends updates, comes free with every Cisco security product. That is really important because security is not static; it is dynamic. New viruses and malware are emerging constantly. Talos ensures that I get updates of everything being seen across the globe so that I am not left behind.

When it comes to protecting against phishing and ransomware, it is pretty good because all identified signatures and non-signature-based protections get updated through threat intelligence. However, as I said, it all depends upon what your attack surface is. If the attack surface is mail, for example, where the bulk of threats get percolated, then it has to be augmented by additional security layers such as email security. Based on the threat attack surface, you have to protect those also with an additional set of software.

The only negative side of Cisco Secure Access is the mindshare. From my perspective, the greatest positive side of Cisco is that it has a very complete story on the entire overall security requirements of a customer, whether it is end user security, network security, or workload security. It covers it all. Having said that, the customer mindshare of looking at Cisco as a security OEM is pretty low. That is one thing which in my mind, Cisco has to really improve.

The second thing is, of course, multiple panes of glass to manage multiple products. That has been a long-standing demand from customers that they should simplify that, and Cisco is working towards it. The third thing is AI integration. Cisco is also aggressively working on AI integration with their products. Mindshare is one of the biggest challenges of Cisco security products, and they have to increase customer awareness sessions to increase the customer mindshare about their security products.

One big challenge which I see with Cisco is their MDR capabilities. They do not provide it as a service, which Palo Alto does provide. Cisco's policy and strategy is to enable partners so that it becomes partner-enabled services using Cisco products. Whereas Palo Alto provides MDR as a service and Sophos provides MDR as a service, Cisco enables partners such as us to provide equivalent services. However, there are multiple enterprise customers who would prefer to go to the OEM for that service. There are multiple big wins which Palo Alto had in India because of their own MDR capability. If I were to fight as a partner with my capability and Cisco products, I surely cannot fight the might of Palo Alto. That is one area where possibly Cisco has to relook.

With regards to my experience with Cisco Secure Access, I have been working with it for at least two years now.

Regarding Cisco Secure Access, I would agree that it is a 99.9% stable and reliable product.

My impression of scalability for Cisco Secure Access is good. Being a cloud solution, it has unlimited scalability. Scalability is not an issue. You can scale based on the number of users and licenses. You have SIA, SPA, and all licenses. Scalability is not an issue since it is a cloud-based solution.

I believe customer service from Cisco is good and not a problem in India.

Regarding the deployment procedure and installation of Cisco Secure Access, it is straightforward and not much of a challenge.

We usually deploy Cisco Secure Access in our Center of Excellence, and we keep demonstrating that to the customers. It is fine and not much of a hassle.

Quantifying the return on investment depends upon what the use case is and the automation we can build up. We just did some study where, with automation and all of that, we can get almost 30% ROI.

In comparing Cisco Secure Access to its competitors in the market, I think the leader is definitely Palo Alto.

Comparing Cisco Secure Access pricing with its peer group, I think they are still comparable in terms of pricing. It also depends upon how desperate Cisco is to win the deal; they can also go better. When I say peer group, I am talking of Palo Altos of the world, and so forth. They are a little bit on the higher side, but still, when it comes to closure of the deal, they get aggressive and they can meet up with the competitive price points.

I have to study more about Cisco Secure Access's ability to provide secure access via HTTP/2 and optionally QUIC, so I am not aware of this, and I will not comment on that.

Summarizing all that I have told you about Cisco Secure Access, mindshare, multiple panes of glass, AI integration, and MDR are all aspects that could be slightly better. Those are the areas for improvement. Overall, I would give Cisco Secure Access a rating of eight out of ten.

The major purposes for which my clients are using Cisco Secure Access  are banking systems and the post office.

The biggest advantage of Cisco Secure Access  for my clients is mainly the security system, such as system vision. Most importantly, routing and switching, especially all the top of rack switches, provide significant value.

When discussing the integration of CASB  functionality with Cisco Secure Access, we are talking in Egypt about multiple layers of integration, not only for Cisco products, but with other vendors such as FortiGate and Palo Alto. In Egypt, we implement a double layer of security filtering between multi-vendors to ensure effective filtering. Multi-factor authentication also supports this at the Cisco layer.

Cisco Secure Access provides secure access via standard HTTP/2 and optionally QUIC protocol, which is important because it adds an advanced layer of security plus identity access management of Office 365 . This means we are not dependent on one layer of identity access management system, which adds another layer of protection from Cisco.

In terms of negative aspects of Cisco Secure Access, it is not easy to manage everything in Cisco products. It requires a high level of professionalism and expertise from a Cisco administrator because the command-line interface is easier to handle, but the GUI is more complicated than other products.

I believe that Cisco could add some new features to the product in the future, such as integrating more with SOAR  solutions and SIEM  solutions.

I am a service provider with Cisco Secure Access.

Cisco Secure Access is a stable and reliable product with approximately 99.9% uptime and reliability.

Cisco Secure Access is very scalable. Cisco has a great benefit in that you can integrate with other solutions in an easy way because it has a lot of protocols to integrate with others and sophisticated steps that we can apply for integration.

I am happy with technical support from Cisco regarding Cisco Secure Access. They address all our questions and technical specifications. They provide answers and solutions effectively.

Regarding the deployment procedure of Cisco Secure Access, I cannot say it is straightforward, nor can I say it is complex. It depends on the design. However, overall, if you have someone at Cisco who knows the design procedures and the main objectives of Cisco Secure Access, it is straightforward and easy.

The return on investment in Cisco Secure Access is significant. With both wireless and security systems, it provides substantial savings in time, data loss prevention, and management of protection. If you are using other products and you are attacked with ransomware, you will pay a lot of money and have limited protection. Protection has a price and also has a benefit.

While ROI varies from customer to customer, regarding time saving, it can reach up to 30% savings. This is based on the processing time and retention policy of Cisco Secure Access, which is more than 30% better than others.

When considering the price of Cisco Secure Access, it is higher than others. However, you pay for what you have. You pay for something that has value, so you have to pay more money.

If I were to rate the price of Cisco Secure Access from 0 to 10 points, I would give it an eight.

When I compare Cisco Secure Access with other products such as Huawei, IBM, or HP, I would say Cisco is the leader. It is at the top because Cisco Secure Access technology depends on analysis, decision-making, and protection, whereas others just introduce a function. It is integrated with AI in recent days. Cisco has the top engine of AI to inspect any type of intrusions, whereas others do not. Cisco is a strong leader in this position, especially when talking about Cisco data centers.

The integration of Cisco Secure Access with Cisco Talos  positively impacts threat detection and response capabilities. It can inspect many attacking and intrusion systems. It provides us very early detection for threats and has great integration between SOAR  and SIEM  solutions. We are using QRadar in a SIEM solution and SOAR system. This makes a very important integration between them.

Cisco Secure Access protects from phishing attacks and ransomware effectively. First, we separate the data center databases or data center applications into a separate VLAN and monitor all these systems through XDR . XDR  makes an inspection for any unusual behavior that can be detected and isolates all network devices or infected devices from the main network to avoid the spread of ransomware throughout the network. XDR is the most effective solution we are currently using, plus the multi-layer of protection from firewall and SOAR system that detects these actions and makes an isolation for the attack and provides detection for how to deal with and respond to this attack.

I give this review an overall rating of nine out of ten.

My clients' use cases for Cisco Secure Access involve both business and technical purposes.

Cisco Secure Access is a zero trust network access solution that I propose mostly for network access so clients can access the network or their cloud platform for workload.

One of the strongest parts of Cisco Secure Access is that along with Cisco SD WAN solution, I propose this as a bigger advantage in access and the DNA for secured access while roaming users to the SD WAN tab.

It is very easy to manage Cisco Secure Access through a single cloud console because along with Cisco DNA architecture, it connects smoothly, and Cisco provides two methods: the catalyst SD WAN solution and Meraki.

It helps to secure standard applications.

When speaking about improvements for Cisco Secure Access, the licensing structure is an area of concern, as many users struggle to understand how it works.

I see technical limitations and challenges on the Catalent DMA solution, especially when integrating it with the SD WAN fabric, and it could be easier to integrate the tools.

In terms of features and capabilities for Cisco Secure Access, it could improve user-friendliness for the Catalyst dashboard, whereas Meraki scores ten out of ten for user experience.

I started working with Cisco Secure Access almost three years back, as I am working with Cisco SoC.

From my two decades of experience with Cisco, I find the solution to be stable.

Cisco Secure Access is generally a scalable product.

My experience with Cisco customer service is satisfactory.

I would rate my experience with Cisco support as a nine.

I am working with a couple of competitors' products for the same use case.

The installation procedure for Cisco Secure Access is case-to-case and depends on the customer workload, which allows for proper study based on customer instructions.

Based on ROI, Cisco Secure Access is worth the investment, as it is a core security product that allows customers to measure their ROI effectively.

In terms of cloud security and SD WAN security, Cisco leads, but in the firewall area, Fortinet is ahead.

My role is that of an integrator with Cisco Secure Access.

Cisco Secure Access integrated with Cisco Talos collaborates effectively, as I see that Cisco Talos has a much higher level of signature intelligence than the competition.

I would say Cisco Secure Access has a huge impact on protecting the company from threats like phishing and ransomware, as Talos provides all the necessary features to mitigate spam, phishing attacks, and offers sophisticated security measures at the gateway and system level.

All these functions will work based on the customer use case, and if the customer uses the SaaS platform, it will help to securely access web applications.

I would say it is beneficial.

The main negative point I see is related to the licensing structure.

I can give Cisco Secure Access an overall score of ten based on my satisfaction with the product.