Akamai vs Cloudflare

What is Akamai WAF?

A key position in the changing WAAP landscape is held by Akamai, a pioneering WAF solution. Dominant in content delivery, Akamai was one of the pioneers in the CDN space.

With its user-friendly, integrated App & API Protector, Akamai offers a variety of cutting-edge technologies, such as DDoS protection, web application firewall, bot mitigation, and API security.

What is Cloudflare WAF?

Web applications and websites are protected from online threats by Cloudflare's Web Application Firewall (WAF), a powerful security feature. It functions as a defense against possible attackers by carefully examining all incoming web traffic, successfully weeding out nefarious requests and stopping possible intrusions.

Cloudflare WAF ensures a faster and safer online experience by improving security and speeding up the operation of numerous websites, APIs, SaaS services, and other online assets.

Advantages of Cloudflare over Akamai WAF

DDoS Mitigation

Strong and efficient DDoS protection options are provided by both Cloudflare and Akamai. Their network capacities are impressive, their coverage is global, and they have a track record of thwarting major attacks.

Significant threats can be effectively stopped by Cloudflare thanks to their extensive network, which spans 209 Tbps across 300 cities in 100 countries.

On the other side, Akamai's vast network capacity of more than 200 Tbps and its 36 Anycast global scrubbing centers, along with its 20 Tbps dedicated DDoS defense, demonstrate its ability to withstand massive attacks.

Both companies place a strong emphasis on infrastructure investments for DDoS protection, providing significant and comparable capabilities to protect against cyber threats that are constantly evolving.

Cloudflare provides an adaptive DDoS mitigation solution that can adapt to shifting user behavior patterns, just like AppTrana. This feature is especially helpful in situations where website traffic fluctuates due to the dynamic nature of the business.

Comprehensive Mundle for SaaS Startups

Cloudflare is a great option for SaaS start-ups because of its amazing array of features, which include strong DDoS, WAF, and API security products, SSL certificate management, and support for vanity domains.

Although there is a significant cost associated with the enterprise plan, start-ups and scale-ups find that the flexible pricing models of the Free, Pro, and Business plans are especially helpful. These enhancements keep up with their changing business requirements.

Akamai, on the other hand, includes many of Cloudflare's features, including API security and bot management. The more sophisticated features of these features, however, are only available as part of premium services, which are more expensive than Cloudflare's plan alternatives.

Why Cloudflare WAF is inferior to Akamai

Page Integrity Manager

The best defense against in-browser attacks is the ability to identify suspicious and malicious script actions. This is accomplished by watching user sessions and real-time scripts with Akamai's Page Integrity Manager.

Websites are shielded from JavaScript threats like formjacking, web skimming, and Magento attacks by this real-user behavioral detection technology.

Akamai, on the other hand, includes many of Cloudflare's features, including API security and bot management. The more sophisticated features of these features, however, are only available as part of premium services, which are more expensive than Cloudflare's plan alternatives.

Managed Service

Akamai offers a comprehensive solution that is customized to meet your business needs with its Managed Security Service. It provides a full range of services, supported by best practices and industry knowledge from Akamai.

They provide the following services:

• Anomaly detection and round-the-clock monitoring.
• Quick action in response to threats that have been identified.
• 24-hour access to an Attack Support Security Operations and Coordination Centre (SOCC).
• Depending on how serious the problem is, a minimum 30-minute response time is guaranteed.
• Comprehensive postmortem report given by security specialists.

Even though the product and managed services are more expensive than those offered by Akamai, the managed service is regularly rated as superior. If you have the money for Akamai, it works really well, particularly with their managed services.

Global Intelligence

At Akamai, more than 400 committed security researchers are always updating security configurations and policies. These professionals work together with real-time threat intelligence feeds and machine learning models to keep the Adaptive Security Engine current. Consequently, Akamai reports an astounding 5X decrease in false positives.

Despite being well-known for its superior threat intelligence, Cloudflare struggles to develop generic rules for the thousands of apps that make up its extensive network, which increases the possibility of false positives.

An Alternative to Cloudflare WAF and Akamai

While Cloudflare and Akamai both provide excellent DDoS mitigation services, it's important to remember that managed service support is only included in or available as add-on for enterprise plans. Should a serious DDoS attack occur, you might have to manage it in-house.

When it comes to DDoS monitoring, virtual patches, or false-positive testing, AppTrana's security research team has you covered. Working closely with the application team to maximize DDoS mitigation and incident response, the bundled managed services team performs the duties of an extended SOC team.

DDoS monitoring in AppTrana is available for $399 on the premium plan. DDoS monitoring requires upgrading to an enterprise plan with Cloudflare, which can be rather expensive, ranging from

While Cloudflare provides chat support, lower-tier plans do not include support, and access to the service starts at $250 per month. On the other hand, AppTrana offers round-the-clock phone, email, and chat support, even with their $99 plan. Using AppTrana has the following additional advantages:

Unmetered DDoS protection

One unique feature of AppTrana is that all of its plans come with free, unmetered DDoS protection. As an add-on, unmetered DDoS protection is provided by Cloudflare and Akamai. An add-on that charges customers $.05 for each 10,000 requests is part of Cloudflare's strategy.

Payload Inspection Size

The maximum payload size for inspection is kept at 128KB by Cloudflare and Akamai. Interestingly, users must adjust the default configuration, which starts at a meagre 8KB, using the configuration settings. Up to 134MB of requests can be inspected by default using AppTrana.

Virtual Patching with a Zero-False Positive Promise

Its virtual patching capabilities are what make the product unique. It keeps all zero-day vulnerabilities automatically patched because of the managed services team's support.

Security researchers also thoroughly test applications to minimize false positives, and your application will automatically apply the rules. Unlike most other Web Application and API Protection (WAAP) solutions, which usually only inform users about patch releases, AppTrana takes a different approach.

With 100% of applications deployed in block mode, AppTrana is the only WAAP platform with an impressive track record.

Automatic API Finding and a Proactive Security Approach

Delivering substantial value, AppTrana WAAP excels at automating positive security models for APIs. In the AppTrana WAAP ecosystem, this all-inclusive procedure includes API discovery, ongoing vulnerability scanning, manual penetration testing, and the development of positive security policies.

Accessibility for teams without Swagger or Postman API documentation is one of its noteworthy benefits. The Swagger file can be easily obtained automatically by using the API discovery feature. The managed services team is also a key resource for helping to create Postman files for important open APIs.

Ease of Use

Cloudflare is not a conventional CDN, in contrast to Akamai, which is one of the primary distinctions between the two. There is a CDN to mirror the content of a conventional CDN. With this method, the content delivery network (CDN) can distinguish between dynamic and static content by knowing where the content is updated. It takes a lot of back-end programming to do this. Contrarily, Cloudflare is a cutting-edge CDN that processes all content via its network and determines internally what information requires caching and what doesn't.

Optimization

Although both content delivery networks (CDNs) offer exceptional security and performance, only Cloudflare fulfils requests made through the website; Akamai and other CDNs only handle static content. As a result, Cloudflare can further optimize. The analytics and apps are able to accomplish this because Cloudflare serves as a proxy between the user and the application server. Cloudflare modifies the response that the server generates to incorporate the newly added functionality.

Key Differences between Akamai and Cloudflare

Tools used in content delivery networks include Cloudflare and Akamai. By safeguarding millions of websites, APIs, and SaaS with network connections, Cloudflare increases performance and boosts. Regarding mobile, cloud, media, and security, Akamai is among the best sources available worldwide. Professional network site Akamai in is preferred by LinkedIn, while companies like Udemy, Digital Ocean, etc. favor Cloudflare. A number of options exist to replace Cloudflare and Akamai, including CloudFront, Cloud CDN, Fastly, and numerous others.

An analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of Cloudflare vs. Akamai:

Cloudflare

• A free plan package is included with Cloudflare, and higher-added plans offer DDoS protection and security. Potential customers are able to afford this bundle.
• Its interface is simple to use, and the setup and installation process are straightforward.
• Cloudflare performs admirably with both dynamic and static media.
• Its feature of extensive app support enables users to install apps via Cloudflare rather than their website.
• It offers free SSL certificates and SSL encryption, and it is very safe.
• It functions well across various content delivery networks.
• IPv6 is automatically enabled, and page rules have greater power.
• It also comes with an official WordPress plugin that makes customization simple.

Benefits of Cloudflare

• Anonymity: When utilizing Cloudflare, a user must always enter a captcha to access any website. Occasionally, this leads to an unneeded obstacle.
  Captcha screens are the primary method used by Cloudflare for user validation, which causes issues for both genuine and prospective users.
• Secure communication: Secure communication via "https" is intercepted by Cloudflare servers, encrypted, and then decrypted using Cloudflare certificates (SSL).
  Cache control is absent from Cloudflare, and users must manually manage Layer 7.

Akamai

When it comes to networks that handle bulk attacks, Akamai is widely present.

With respect to protection views and regular updates on current events, Akamai offers customizable rules for its site defender.

• 3 terabytes of bandwidth per second are allotted by Akamai specifically for DDoS absorption.
• Tools for rate-controlling traffic segments in accordance with the effects of request rates are offered by Akamai.
  The bandwidth costs are capped in the event of an unexpected and sudden attack that damages a significant amount of bandwidth. This is known as bursting fees.
  For defence against attacks at the application layer, Akamai offers a web application firewall, or WAF.
• Akamai sells its services through a comprehensive reseller programme.

Benefits of Akamai

Akamai is much more expensive than other security-related CDN services, which typically cost about a third of what Akamai charges.
Security propagation takes some time because of its extensive CDN network structure.

Difference between Cloudflare and Akamai

Conclusion

Both Akamai and Cloudflare are strong CDN suppliers, each with their own advantages. While Cloudflare sticks out for its emphasis on security and easy setup, Akamai shines for its wide range of services and support for live video. Nonetheless, your unique requirements and tastes will play a major role in selecting the ideal option for live video streaming.

The top CDN-providing services are Cloudflare and Akamai. Cloudflare boosts network speed and website performance by combining network security and performance solutions. In addition, it offers web optimization and secure DNS with load balancing. Being a worldwide CDN, Akamai offers a very safe mobile and online experience. As with pay-as-you-go, this pricing model is sufficiently scalable. In comparison to Cloudflare, Akamai offers a lot of advantages, but these are derived from paid services, which are costlier than Cloudflare's free offerings. The optimal image is always automatically delivered by Akamai to every end user. When it comes to support and product guidance, Cloudflare responds quickly. Both CDNs are easy to set up and offer extensive coverage.