Business organizations worldwide battle with incidents of security breaches and data loss yearly. To mitigate some of these security threats, software engineers developed endpoint detection and response software solutions to track and secure endpoints against security attacks.
With security threats being a major concern for business organizations, multiple EDR software solutions are crisscrossing the market. To help you pick one of the best endpoint detection and response tools, we compare two popular EDR software solutions: CrowdStrike and FireEye.
What is CrowdStrike?
CrowdStrike is a popular and powerful EDR product built to deliver quality endpoint detection and response capabilities, providing business organizations with in-depth security coverage and real-time network visibility.
With this endpoint detection and response tool, the workload of security engineers is reduced as the software automates the detection of all kinds of advanced threats and responds in time to remediate and forestall potential damages to network endpoints.
What is FireEye?
FireEye Endpoint Security solution is one of the best EDR tools that combines the traditional antivirus and modern real-time security features to automate the detection and protection of network endpoints against security threats.
This EDR tool increases endpoint visibility and delivers security data to assist security analysts in automating protection, immediately determining the degree of any attack activity and adjusting endpoint defenses.
CrowdStrike vs FireEye: Feature comparison
| Feature | CrowdStrike | FireEye |
|---|---|---|
| Automated detection | Yes | Yes |
| Containment | Yes | Yes |
| Terminate malicious activity | Yes | No |
| Cloud compatibility | Yes | Yes |
| Behavioral analytics | Yes | No |
| Alert management workflow | No | Yes |
| MDR availability | Yes | No |
Head-to-head comparison: CrowdStrike vs. FireEye
Range of function
CrowdStrike allows users to use its security software from anywhere in the world with an internet connection. In addition, the program’s cloud component makes it particularly helpful for large enterprises.
In a world where remote work is becoming critical to the success of huge organizations, CrowdStrike can easily be accessed by all workers, regardless of their locations, without fear of endpoint vulnerabilities.
On the other hand, FireEye’s cloud functionality is not as cohesive and seamless as CrowdStrike. Hence, smaller enterprises without cloud-based infrastructures should adopt the tool overCrowdStrike.
Traditional scanning ability
By traditional scanning ability, we refer to the ability of a tool to conduct an easy manual scan of systems for malware. FireEye provides that easy solution. Yes, it could be argued that security threats have grown beyond simple system scans for viruses, but some organizations still fancy it as a first step to mitigating large-scale attacks.
CrowdStrike is not built to provide a simple service such as a manual system scan of computers. Instead, it’s mainly built for automation and detection of security breaches at endpoints of larger networks.
Stability
A fascinating aspect of the CrowdStrike EDR product is that it can offer real-time data monitoring and, at the same time, keep your hardware functioning at a stable speed. This means that the stability and speed of your hardware are not sacrificed for the automated security function of the tool. Hence, there is hardly any incidence of sluggishness when using this product.
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Although FireEye offers some level of stability, CrowdStrike offers much more in maintaining security without recording a downtime or slowing down your infrastructures.
Simplicity of use
With FireEye Endpoint Security, users can easily integrate the product with other environments and software more than the CrowdStrike EDR tool. This provides a level of flexibility and simplicity valuable in any anti-virus program. It’s also easy to use and precise when detecting unknown spyware in local computer networks. These characteristics combine to make it a highly useful piece of software.
Cloud visibility
The cloud monitoring capabilities of CrowdStrike are platform agnostic. Because the endpoint tool does not favor one cloud platform over another, there’s no need to worry about migrating infrastructures to a particular cloud platform before using the product.
It also means that you can easily migrate your applications across cloud environments without any issues while using the EDR product.
Speed
CrowdStrike beats FireEye in speed when executing a search for logs or data. With CrowdStrike, you have a quick search feature that shows in-depth results from logs and threat hunting data. Unlike the FireEye tool, CrowdStrike also helps end users categorize and prioritize alerts when returning search results. Users then find out which alert poses a greater threat.
Data recording
Both products offer data recording and insight into security monitoring activities; however, CrowdStrike is more comprehensive. For example, CrowdStrike EDR software allows for mapping alerts to MITRE Adversarial Tactics.
Choosing between CrowdStrike and FireEye
Both CrowdStrike and FireEye are top EDR products in the market. There is just a thin line between what they offer to users. However, some basic factors and features should inform your choice when going for any of them.
Organizations with more cloud-based infrastructures should consider adopting CrowdStrike as their EDR tool due to its seamless compatibility with cloud platforms. On the other hand, if you have a small or mid-sized business, FireEye would be more suitable for you due to its simplicity with integration functionalities.
