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IBM Security Guardium DSPM vs Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 29, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Qualys TotalCloud
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
39
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (11th), Container Security (11th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (8th), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (8th), SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) (1st), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (6th)
IBM Security Guardium DSPM
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (17th)
Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto N...
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
114
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (8th), Container Security (2nd), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (2nd), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (2nd), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (2nd)
 

Featured Reviews

RO
IT Security Expert at Alior Bank S.A.
Unified risk scoring has improved our cloud visibility and simplifies remediation priorities
Qualys TotalCloud provides unified vulnerability and threat assessment across both IAS and SaaS. This solution provides a single prioritized view of risk, which helps reduce the work I would have to do. We are no longer based on CVSS; we are based on Qualys risk scoring, which is based on CVSS plus internal findings made by Qualys, and then assigns its own score. The TruRisk insight feature has found a small number of assets with high vulnerability scores, though I am cautious since some information is classified. Qualys TotalCloud has positively impacted our bank's performance, and we have definitely seen benefits after implementing this solution.
DevidharsanJ - PeerSpot reviewer
Advisory Consultant at Fiserv
Comprehensive data monitoring has strengthened compliance and protected sensitive information
In terms of improvements for IBM Security Guardium DSPM, I believe there is potential for enhancement in the operational perspective, particularly in the user interface and the deployment of agents. I think they could benefit from having a singular agent that can be pushed directly from a centralized console instead of relying on Unix or Windows admins for deployment.
reviewer2776578 - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber Security Architect at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Image scanning has supported consistent security practices during cloud deployment
On a scale of ten, we would say people are happy with Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks for the part we use. People are okay with it. We probably would give an eight. We don't give ten because if we don't use the other parts of Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, it's because it was difficult to implement from an operational point of view. We could have deployed the runtime monitoring with Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, but within our organization at our company, it was very difficult to find who would be the owner for the alerts. People have other tools and in the end, we don't use the full capabilities of a product that we pay for. It's partially related to the difficulty to integrate Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks runtime in our company's support process. We don't use the real-time monitoring part of Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks. We don't know about the automated remediation feature of Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The most valuable feature is extensibility."
"In my opinion, this is the best tool."
"I highly recommend Qualys TotalCloud to other users."
"TotalCloud's best feature is the integration of cloud accounts. It helps with the risk and security posture management of our cloud infrastructure."
"I would recommend Qualys TotalCloud to other users because it is cost-efficient and has a good return on investment."
"One of the features I appreciate is the ability to generate daily reports without relying on anyone else."
"We were able to realize its benefits within 24 to 48 hours."
"The best feature would be the ability to create policies. It is easy to control and update policies as required."
"The most important aspect of database activity monitoring is that it complies with the regulations, offering pre-built reports and numerous options in IBM Security Guardium DSPM to tune policies, along with various integrations such as with SIEM and ticketing products, making it a more compatible product compared to others."
"It also provides us with a single tool to manage our entire cloud architecture. In fact, we are using a multi-account strategy with our AWS organization. We use Prisma as a single source of truth to identify high- or medium-severity threats inside our organization."
"Overall, it provides all the pieces of information that you require, in one place and time."
"Prisma's identity-based micro-segmentation is better than all its competitors."
"You can also integrate with Amazon Managed Services. You can also get a snapshot in time, whether that's over a 24-hour period, seven days, or a month, to determine what the estate might look like at a certain point in time and generate reports from that for vulnerability management forums."
"With the query language, we can analyze logs and find out which IPs are malicious. It also provides a graphical representation. It provides the overall visibility and how the traffic is flowing. We can see where the malicious IP is and whether it is an insider threat or an outsider threat."
"Prisma Cloud offers robust runtime scanning capabilities, which is beneficial for security teams."
"It has improved the overall collaboration between SecOps and DevOps. Now, instead of asking people to do something, it is a default offering in the CI/CD. There is less manual intervention and more seamless integration. It is why we don't have many dependencies across many teams, which is definitely a better state."
"The framework to configure controls is pretty good; it's pretty sophisticated. We can implement a fair amount of testing for a fair number of controls."
 

Cons

"I would appreciate additional integration options to connect Qualys TotalCloud with our other vulnerability management tools."
"Their support could be improved."
"The cloud licensing unit system is unclear, especially since "units" aren't well-defined."
"We would like to see Windows-based sensors available in Qualys, as this would make the platform more versatile and support a broader range of environments."
"There should be improvement from a dashboard perspective when collecting and showcasing data to lead management."
"The price is very expensive, actually."
"The support is not up to the mark and seems to be overburdened."
"Qualys TotalCloud's increasing complexity, due to the development and deployment of multiple solutions, is making the GUI difficult to navigate."
"In terms of improvements for IBM Security Guardium DSPM, I believe there is potential for enhancement in the operational perspective, particularly in the user interface and the deployment of agents."
"Prisma Cloud's dashboards should be customizable. That's very important. Other similar solutions are more elastic so you have the power to create customized dashboards. In Prisma Cloud, you cannot do that."
"One thing that is missing is Cloud Run runtime security—serverless. That would be great to have in the tool. It's not that easy to have Cloud Run in specific environments."
"We would like to have the detections be more contemporaneous. For example, we've seen detections of an overprivileged user or whatever it might be in any of the hundreds of Prisma policies, where there are 50 minutes of latency between the event and the alert."
"The user interface should be improved and made easier."
"They need to make the settings more flexible to fit our internal policies about data."
"The first time I looked at Prisma Cloud, it took me a while to understand how to implement the integration or how to enable features by using the interface for integration. That portion can probably be improved."
"We had some teething issues with Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, but overall, it did what we expected."
"It does not provide runtime security or protection for Windows Server. It is currently lacking in terms of Windows environment."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its price seems higher compared to other tools, but it is worth it. If they could adjust the pricing and make it comparable with other tools, that would be great."
"Qualys TotalCloud is expensive, but it offers a premier solution with no headaches."
"Qualys TotalCloud is expensive."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers good pricing that is affordable and competitive with the market. Our partnership also provides us with additional benefits."
"The cost is high, but it meets our organizational needs."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers competitive pricing given its comprehensive suite of features, including integration, assessment, remediation, and detection capabilities, all within a single platform."
"Although Qualys TotalCloud is relatively expensive due to its unique automation features, its cost-effectiveness is rated an eight out of ten, with ten being the most costly."
"TotalCloud's price is about right where I would expect it to be."
Information not available
"Our licensing fees are $18,000 USD per year."
"The cost depends on the pricing model. Compared to other solutions, the cost isn't that bad."
"We are encountering some resistance in the African market regarding the cost of Prisma Cloud."
"Prisma Cloud is affordable."
"The pricing is competitive; for the most part, the security firms have similar prices."
"The price for Prisma Cloud is reasonable."
"The pricing is competitive. From what I have seen in the past, it is on par with the others."
"Prisma Cloud is remarkably expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
No data available
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise29
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business37
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise57
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Qualys TotalCloud?
Areas that need improvement in every solution include the remediation part. The remediation steps should be simple en...
What is your primary use case for Qualys TotalCloud?
Our use case involves the assets that we have under cloud, the assets exposed to the internet, and the internal appli...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Security Guardium DSPM?
The pricing of IBM Security Guardium DSPM is based on the number of database servers it covers. I am not sure if my c...
What needs improvement with IBM Security Guardium DSPM?
In terms of improvements for IBM Security Guardium DSPM, I believe there is potential for enhancement in the operatio...
What is your primary use case for IBM Security Guardium DSPM?
The usual use cases for IBM Security Guardium DSPM that I mostly work with are normal data protection, vulnerability ...
What is your primary use case for Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks?
Prisma Cloud helps support DevSecOps methodologies, making those responsibilities easier to manage.
What Cloud-Native Application Protection Platform do you recommend?
We like Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, since it offers us incredible visibility into our entire cloud system. We...
What do you think of Aqua Security vs Prisma Cloud?
Aqua Security is easy to use and very manageable. Its main focus is on Kubernetes and Docker. Security is a very valu...
 

Also Known As

Qualys TotalCloud with FlexScan
Polar Security
Prisma Public Cloud, RedLock Cloud 360, RedLock, Twistlock, Aporeto
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Information Not Available
Amgen, Genpact, Western Asset, Zipongo, Proofpoint, NerdWallet, Axfood, 21st Century Fox, Veeva Systems, Reinsurance Group of America
Find out what your peers are saying about Wiz, Palo Alto Networks, Varonis and others in Data Security Posture Management (DSPM). Updated: June 2026.
900,747 professionals have used our research since 2012.