Meraki umbrella opinions / feedback

[dapaulio]

There have been some chatter about alternatives to smoothwall and umbrella has been pitched, but before the last month I never heard of them nor googling reviews there is little to nothing out therein terms of reviews. What is everyone else thoughts and opinions.

[Aprice]

Umbrella is really DNS filtering, it might do the job mostly, but I wouldn't say it's an alternative to Smoothwall.

 

In the corporate space I wouldn't take issue with it, but in education I wouldn't be as confident with just Umbrella.

[Norphy]

Agreed. A DNS filter like Umbrella can do URL filtering but Smoothwall does content analysis as well. Umbrella can be a useful supplement to a content filter but for a school it won’t replace it Edited June 26, 2024 by Norphy

[tom_newton]

Thanks folks - some useful comments. I would agree that a DNS filter is not a suitable thing for an education environment. A blunt instrument.

Additionally there is not even a self certified response from them in the "appropriate filtering" vendor responses at the safer internet centre.

[Norphy]

That's not to say that I don't think it's not worth looking at alternatives to Smoothwall. Maybe you'll find something, maybe you won't. But I think it's always worth reviewing what you're running every so often, if only to keep the vendor on their toes.

[dapaulio]

Thank you all for your comments and I am very much in support with keeping smoothwall within all of our schools.

Please keep them coming as at the moment I am kicking back against our accounts teams who are no doubted just trying to find a cheaper solution