Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) Reviews

I am not certain if I am using the latest version. It is the one which is made for TV. 

We use the solution to access control. Prior to any device being authenticated on the network, a person must login to the solution's site for authentication purposes. 

While the solution has a host of features, we only use the one involving access control. 

We are looking into further uses for it. My aim is to deploy it across all three of our sites and not just one. 

There is much room for improvement, especially after having perused the documentation on the solution's website. 

The solution lacks properly knowledgeable support, especially internationally, and this is why I am exploring other applications. 

I would need time to expand my knowledge of the solution and consult with the Cisco engineers before I could point to other pain points. 

I have been using Cisco ISE (Identity Services Engine) since 2015. 

So far, we have had no issues with the stability. 

There should be more knowledgeable support, particularly in the international sphere. 

I have no doubt that we will get there. They contacted me yesterday, which makes it likely that by weeks-end we should be able to build a structure and do many things with the solution. This would allow me to know where I am standing, explore further and even examine the possibility of implementing some of Cisco's other features. 

We did not use other solutions prior to the current one and will likely not explore others in the future. The current one should be fine. 

The installation was straightforward, although it will likely involve a more complex implementation in the future.

As the previous installation was not complex, it did not take long. 

I believe I have paid around $1,000 in licensing fees. The license is annual. 

We did not really explore other options prior to using the solution. We considered Fortigate, but found it to not be very straightforward, which is why we decided to go with the current solution. 

While we have focused on the access control aspects of the solution, the documentation demonstrates that it has many more features, so I would like to explore it further. 

We are customers of Cisco. 

At the moment, we have around 250 users making use of the solution. 

I rate Cisco ISE (Identity Services Engine) as a five out of ten. This is because I wish to explore further any additional features that can add value to our organization, especially on the IT security side. 

This solution ties into our Cisco Duo and Cisco AnyConnect connections to help us authenticate against the active directory and Cisco Duo multifactor authentication. It takes metrics about the connections that are connecting it and allows us to set up a rule against them. For instance, if a Windows device is not all the way up to date, we can put a message up that says, "Before you're able to connect, please do your Windows updates as they haven't been done in six months."

As this solution allows AnyConnect to authenticate with the active directory in the backend, the users won't directly use it. Still, it will be in use throughout the login process into Cisco AnyConnect as a source of authentication.

With this solution, we don't require anyone for maintenance.

The ability to integrate our Cisco AnyConnect connections to the active directory has been great. Also, as a source of authentication during the process of logging into Cisco AnyConnect has been very useful for us. 

It perfectly does everything we have been looking for it to do. I have not discovered any feature sets or items that are lacking. It's a much more functional product than the old Cisco ACS that it replaced. 

That being said, during deployment, they shipped us the Cisco ISE with the 3.1 operating system, which was incompatible with the license that we had purchased, which would only allow us to go up to version 2.9. Because of this, we actually had to do a factory reset and a reload to the operating system — to an older version of the operating system. This required a very extensive process. We had to take out the Cisco ISE and put it into a factory reset mode to get it to roll back to the old operating system. If we were doing an upgrade, this would have been very simple, but as we were doing a downgrade, it was extremely complex and very labor-intensive. I was crawling through the server room, through wires, to plug things in, to get it to connect in the way that it needed to be connected with an external device in order to actually get it to roll back.

I don't like that the licensing structure doesn't allow us to have the 3.1 operating system — it forces us to use version 2.9. If you don't want to pay a monthly or a yearly subscription fee, either that device should have come automatically with the 2.9 version operating system, or it should have been much easier to actually roll it back. Additionally, support should have realized that our license requires us to have the 2.9 operating system instead of the 3.1 operating system, which would have saved us a lot of time. 

It would be nice if it could be configured easily by default. If you're configuring a Cisco device, you pretty much need the support of a CCNA-level technician to be able to do it. It would be nice if there was a default or a more simple way to do it. It's not really a requirement to use the device because you can purchase the premium support or you could get a CCNA in-house to do it. Just having that ability to say, "Hey, we want to set this up" without too many complications or without having to bring in support would be nice. 

We've only been using this solution for the past three months. 

The scalability reports that we could easily handle a million users. 

I have been extensively involved with their technical support; their technical support is very good. They're more than willing to just jump on and do things for you. My only complaint is that at one point, we were trying to configure our single channel for Cisco Duo to be able to perform a password reset. Whenever we needed to look closely at another device, the support technician would say, "Hold on, let me bring in my expert on VPN; hold on, let me bring in my expert on Cisco ASA." We basically had to wait until we were able to get the Cisco Duo support agent, the Cisco ASA support agent, the Cisco VPN support agent, and the Cisco ISE support agent — all in the WebEx meeting at the same time.

As far as I'm to understand, there are CCNAs that should have been able to do it, but they brought in the experts from each item instead of just directly doing it themselves — this made the whole process take longer. Still, they were able to do everything in a way that did not affect our live environment, even though it was on the same device. That was actually very nice because it meant that we could do it in the middle of the day instead of having to do things in the middle of the night.

The initial setup was very simple. Everything was set up within an hour thanks to assistance from the onboarding teams from Duo and Cisco, and our network administrator. They got it set up and reviewed a bunch of options with us. It was a very easy and nice process.

Implementation was achieved with in-house resources and premium onboarding support. The entire process only took an hour.

We are running version 2.9 because version 2.9 of the ISE has a persistent license —it's a one-time payment. The latest version (3.1) is only available if you do a yearly subscription.

It's a licensed physical device; there is no subscription. If you want the latest operating system, then you'll need to get an annual license.

If you're planning on using this solution, my advice is to be sure you review the full feature set available and select what is important to your users. This way you'll be able to ensure that you'll have everything you want and need.

Overall, on a scale from one to ten, I would definitely give this solution a rating of nine. 

We have two servers and they're both VMs. Every network system is issued a certificate and each device coming onto the network has to be on the domain with an active AD user logging into it. It needs an up-to-date AMP, which is our Cisco malware and virus scan product and it also needs to have the most current Microsoft security updates and the three layers that we're using: The core VPN, the Network Access Manager and the ISE profiler. When it goes through all those different things on every port on the switch, there are commands for it to be able to go through an ACL so it knows what users are there, what server, and what devices have been put onto the domain. It can verify all that.

The user can then proceed on to the network. We've set it so that regular users are VLAN'd off and can only see the data network through ISE and are blocked from seeing the rest of the network. Depending on the department needs or other factors, we have cameras for security which are on a different VLAN, and they can see those. We also have something for O&M where the AC guy can see the AC equipment, and we can prevent all the VLAN's from being viewed by everybody.

We are customers of Cisco and I'm the infrastructure and Cyber security manager.

The solution cuts down on the repercussions of getting malware or ransomware which happened to us four years ago. We regularly took very aggressive snapshots and we were able to recover in an hour and 20 minutes without any loss of data.

Because we have a large database and 4,000 network devices, the solution can lag a bit when you're running updates or different things because of the fact that it's so big and it is such a resource hog. But the biggest problem we've encountered is that it finds errors or people are rejected or not authenticated without a clear explanation as to why. A second issue is that we're currently on 2.4 and Cisco's gold standard now is 2.7. They are a little slow with that.

I'd really like the solution to dive down a little deeper when something's not profiling. As it stands now, you have to go through and search what hasn't profiled. Microsoft, for example, gives you a direction to look at and will even be specific sometimes and tell you there is a password error, or the password hasn't been updated, or it's not meeting the policy and that's why it won't let it through. Those are very helpful because you know exactly what's required to solve a problem. 

Cisco is getting better with it, but they fail in some areas because of a network connectivity issue, or it's not getting DCAP quick enough and it fails. Those things would be more helpful to understand when it's going through, so you are able to triage it a little better. I mean, it does point you in a direction, but sometimes you have to dig a lot deeper to find the right direction and figure out what kept it from profiling. One big issue we've discovered is that people are not rebooting their machines or powering them off at night. We're trying to ensure that is done by sticking messages on screens.

I've been using this solution for the past two years. 

ISE is pretty stable. If it does have an issue then you need to call TAC and work through the bug in it. They are very responsive and very quick to help us eliminate the issue and also come up with a plan, such as how to move forward with additional issues or different things that are coming down the pipe with Cisco ISE. When you're talking to them, you feel like they are a partner and not just a disconnected entity.

The technical support is excellent, I would rate them very highly.

The initial setup is very complex. You have to go in and manually add in all the network devices, as far as all the switches, access points are concerned. You have to go port by port and add in codes and conditions and you have to go switch by switch and add in codes and conditions. You start out with a monitor mode and then go to an impact mode and then you go towards total lockdown. Implementation took us about 18 months. We rolled it out in short bursts because we have a very small IT team and we had a consultant company come in and work with us on installing it. A lot of it was knowledge transfer from them to us.

Our consultant was Cycorp, their main focus is network security. They are a sister Cisco partner, and we had one of their CCIE's come out and help implement everything. The gentleman at the top of the CCIE, was a former Cisco employee and a beta tester for ISE. Now that we have it in, I feel it's pretty much a game changer on locking down our network so that we're not penetrated from inside or outside because everything going through the VPN has to meet a certain standard.

We did a five year deal and it was very reasonable. I think for the Avast virus scan, I think we were paying $95 a machine for five years, which nobody else could touch. And that includes all updates, technical support, etc. From the ISE side, I'm not really sure what it costs because it was all encompassed in equipment we were buying and the ISE and the AMP and the open DNS. I know that it was not more expensive than any of the things we had looked at with HP or BMC or other places. It was much more cost effective.

We have looked at other products but we are a Cisco shop so having a Cisco product rides very easy on all our switches, our access points, and our Cisco servers. I believe it's the same for other companies such as HP. It's also a priority for them that the solution works better with HP switches. Given that we weren't going to change our switches, we really needed to focus on something that was going to work well with our environment.

The important thing is to have a good game plan going into it. Prep is key for everything going on with ISE. The more stuff you have prepped and the more understanding that you have upfront of how it goes through and how it behaves, the better off you are.

I would rate this solution a nine out of 10. 

We use it to ensure that any device that connects to our network or wireless environment is a company-owned asset and has all the security certificates. We aren't doing too much remediation. We just identify whether it's one of our assets and whether it's allowed.

In our company, we have a lot of remote workers. Knowing that even devices that are coming through a VPN comply with our policies, whether they're in the office or they're remote, face the same level of scrutiny is a benefit to our company.

We can set as in-depth alerts as we want to. We can set up an alert through email, text, etc.

It has helped to improve our cybersecurity resilience. It helps to ensure that all devices meet the patching and certificate requirements.

It's keeping our company safe from rogue devices connecting to our network. From a security standpoint, there's peace of mind knowing that every device that connects is a good one.

The upgrades could be better. Every time we try to do an upgrade, we have problems. It's a pain.

I've only been with the company for six months, but they adopted Cisco ISE about three to five years ago.

Support has always been good. Overall, I'd rate them an eight out of ten. Sometimes it feels that their first-level support hasn't been trained in-depth.

Positive

We have redundant solutions across all of our data centers, policy nodes, and authentication nodes. As far as I know, we started off in a small deployment with our wireless. We profiled our devices to ensure that they belonged to our companies before we let them access, and then from there, we expanded into profiling wired ports as well, so we started very small and then moved to a larger solution.

In terms of our plans to increase its usage, we may use Cisco ISE in different ways, but the number of nodes that we have will probably stay the same. With version 2, we're moving more of our deployment to the cloud, so we'll move from the on-premise solution to the cloud. We've already started the process. We have some nodes built in the cloud, and we just have to move the production and then remove our on-prem. We're using Oracle Cloud for our highest deployments. It will be fully cloud.

We've seen a return on investment from the security aspect.

I'd advise starting just the way we did. Start small because there are a lot of use cases of Cisco ISE. If you try to do it all at once, you might be disappointed, so start small and pick an area that you'd like to focus on, get that piece done, and then go from there. 

It hasn't really helped to free up our IT staff for other projects. It also hasn't helped us consolidate any tools. 

Overall, I'd rate Cisco ISE an eight out of ten.

We mainly use it for endpoint security.

Cisco ISE has made our network more secure. 

It has saved the time of our security team. I can't say how much time it has saved because I'm on the network side, but I'd imagine it has saved quite a bit of time. It lets them sleep better at night.

It does a good job of securing our infrastructure from end to end so that we can detect and remediate threats, but I don't have a similar product to compare.

It hasn't helped to consolidate any tools. The customer is in the process of migrating from their current ACS to ISE. When they've done that, we'll consolidate that piece. This consolidation would provide a single pane of management versus multiple tools.

I'd imagine it has helped our organization improve its cybersecurity resilience, but the security team would know more about it.

The ability to allow or deny hosts onto the network is valuable. It provides great security to the network environment.

It could be more intuitive in terms of how to configure the policies.

I've been using Cisco ISE for four years.

It's very stable.

It's very scalable. We have deployed it globally.

Their support is good. I'd rate them a seven out of ten.

Neutral

We didn't use any other solution previously. We went for Cisco ISE because we're a Cisco shop. It helps to have one vendor for network management and security.

Cisco's Professional services did the installation. I wasn't involved in its installation, but they did a pretty good job.

I'd imagine we have seen an ROI, but I'm not involved in the pricing or purchasing. The security it provides gives peace of mind. That's a good return.

My advice would be to do an evaluation of the product and purchase it.

I'd rate Cisco ISE an eight out of ten.

We use it for Community WiFi and TACACS authentication. It is service provider authentication, both for the core infrastructure and Community WiFi.

We were looking to solve captive portal and centralized authentication with Cisco ISE.

It has allowed us to pull in multiple authentication databases, then centralize them into a captive portal system.

It is important for our organization that the solution considers all resources to be external. It treats them with minimum trust.

Integration is a big factor. That has really been the driving force behind it.

Documentation is probably the worst part of the software.

I have been using it for about five years.

It is very stable. I would rate the stability as 10 out of 10.

We don't use its scalability. I would rate it as five out of 10.

The technical support is good. I would rate them as six out of 10.

Neutral

We previously used an open-source solution. We switched for vendor support and scalability.

We don't monetize this solution.

It is fair.

We did not evaluate other options.

It is worth checking out the integration that it provides. It is a strong platform.

Cybersecurity resilience has not been that important for our organization.

I would rate ISE as eight out of 10. It does exactly what it is supposed to do without much issue.

Our use case is managing access to network devices for IT as well as end-users. Making that seamless is the challenge we were looking to handle.

ISE made implementation and connecting things easy.

It does a good job of establishing trust for each access request, no matter the source. It's also very effective at helping with the distributed network and at securing access.

The UI and UX could be more seamless and easier to use.

I've been using Cisco ISE (Identity Services Engine) for six years.

The stability of the solution is pretty good. I've only had a couple of issues.

I've never tried to scale it up.

We have it deployed in multiple locations with users across the US and Canada.

I have never used the technical support.

It's done the job that we put it in place to do.

It's mostly for authentication to our network for our end-users.

It's allowed us to create groups for different vendors and for employees in various groups in our company, without giving everyone access.

It has also given us a lot of extra security as the backbone of authentication for our VPN and wireless network.

The policy sets give us more granular groups for end-user access.

I've been using Cisco ISE (Identity Services Engine) for five years.

The stability is really great. We haven't had any issues with it. We've had it for a long time. We ran an old version for three or four years without any issues.

From what I have read, the scalability seems good. We haven't had to deal much with that. We have two nodes and about 2,000 sessions going at once.

Technical support is very good. They've always been there to answer any questions, and if they don't know the answer they make sure to find someone who can give me the answer.

Positive

Cyber security resilience has been at the top of our list since 2020 because we had so many people working from home and that increased as time went on. That opened our eyes.

I was involved when we upgraded at the beginning of this year. It was pretty straightforward, although we reached out for outsourced help.

We used a CDW consultant.

For us, the return on investment is that it gives us easy ways to divide up our end-users for authentication, especially for our VPN.

The pricing seems fair. The licensing can be confusing, but it is still pretty good.

I was asked a couple of years ago, when we were having issues with ISE, if there were alternatives, and I said I didn't want to switch because we're so embedded in this solution already.

Talk to someone outside of Cisco too, if you're thinking about ISE. That way, you can get all the information.

We wanted to outsource some of our work because I only have two years of admin experience and another of our network engineers has about a year. This way, if the system goes down, we have a quick way to get it back up.

I would tell leaders who want to add cyber security resiliency to make sure they include team members who are involved and not just make decisions on their own.