Cisco Umbrella

Cisco Umbrella Review

Cisco Umbrella is a cloud based DNS web security gateway, offering powerful and effective security for businesses. The service blocks malware and phishing attempts from the web and integrates which existing security tools to deliver all round protection. The service also gives real time visibility on all devices on your network and roaming users to ensure they are all safely browsing and secured. The use of DNS means threats are stopped over all ports and protocols. Request rerouting is used to effectively protect without impacting performance.

Cisco has a global network and processes billions of DNS requests from millions of users daily. They are the largest vendor of DNS based web security with 175 billion daily requests, 90 million users and 30 data centres worldwide.

Benefits of Cisco Umbrella

• Comprehensive reports delivered through accessible, modern user interface
• Strong research into attacks to keep the threat protection ahead of the curve on upcoming security issues with statistical models on historical data to help analyse future threats
• Very popular service for MSPs as it’s easy to install and offers comprehensive protection for customers without having management
• Market leading filtering and protection with URL category filtering, domain level blocking and more
• Granular administration controls with both pre-made and customisable policies
• Active Directory integration
• Good reporting with accessible logs and audits as well as real time visibility of users on the network
• 80 content categories covering billions of webpages with easy management of high, moderate or low content settings and allow and block lists for admins
• Popular with customers, who highly recommend the service

What you should know about Cisco Umbrella

• Threat protection is good, but needs to be part of a multi-layered security approach
• More expensive than competitors for fully featured tiers, although multiple subscription levels offered
• Not as quite easy to manage admin controls as Webroot, although user interface is better
• No reporting on cloud services available

Expert Insights Verdict on Cisco Umbrella

Cisco Umbrella is a market leading DNS based web secure gateway service. The billions of webpages filtered and advanced research intel into threat protection makes it obvious why Cisco Umbrella is the most popular DNS service on the market. The admin controls are also highly customisable with multiple security policies, 80 content categories, SafeSearch and Block Bypass. There is also AD integration offered. Reporting and auditing is easy to read and offers good visibility into the safety of businesses, with full log retention, pre made reports and scheduled reporting. The service is more expensive than competitors however and it should be known that the threat protection offered by Cisco Umbrella should be layered with other security products rather than taken as an all-in-one solution.

Expert Insights would recommend Cisco Umbrella to larger companies who don’t mind paying a higher rate for the most popular product in the DNS web security market offering an easy to use, secure service. However, for companies who want a cheaper alternative, with the same level of threat protection and better reporting, we would recommend Webroot.