Comparison of DDoS-Guard and Cloudflare's free protection module in ispmanager
Tags: ispmanager, security, cybersecurity
Published: 2023-12-07 03:56:39

_How the insides of protection tools differ and which one is right for you_

DDoS (which stands for Distributed Denial of Service attack) is essentially an online disruption. Attackers use an army of hijacked computers to bombard a website with a huge number of requests. Their goal is to temporarily or permanently deny access to the resource. For any company, this is primarily a reputational risk, but for businesses whose profits come from the website, there are also losses due to downtime. To avoid this, many solutions have been created to combat or prevent attacks. 
In this article, we will look at some of the most popular DDoS protection tools available in the ispmanager panel: the free Cloudflare and the paid module from DDoS-Guard. And while it may seem unreasonable to some to compare a free and a paid solution, many users still think that both services offer a similar level of protection. So let's take a look at the main differences between these two services to help you choose the right option for your online business.  

## Protection level

- **DDoS-Guard** protects against L7 attacks from the very first request. It scans the system and activates automatically at the first sign of an attack. No IP blocking, with the ability to geo-block and create unique protection rules to filter requests to ensure a high level of legitimate traffic retention. Protects against even massive DDoS attacks with densities of up to 3.2 TB/s.

- **Cloudflare (free version)** also offers L7-level protection, but with IP blocking. The protection must be manually enabled, and the developers note that enabling Under Attack Mode (IUAM) prevents the use of APIs and affects third-party analytics tools. This is due to the fact that Cloudflare requires JavaScript browser support to display and transmit the intermediate page. 

## 2. Documentation and technical support

- In addition to forum and documentation support, **DDoS-Guard** provides free customer support with a response time of up to 6 hours and a guaranteed SLA of at least 99.5%.

- **Cloudflare free version** does not have support from experts. There is documentation, forum and community help. No uptime SLA guarantees are given.

## 3. Price

- **DDoS-Guard** — is a commercial product and there are costs associated with its use. However, it should be noted that the cost does not depend on the volume of protected traffic, and the price includes protection of one domain and all subdomains. The price on the site starts from 60€ per month.

- The **free version of Cloudflare** includes standard L7 protection and traffic analysis through Cloudflare's distribution centers. However, popular features such as rate limiting, which allows you to block an IP, are charged separately. The price of the plan depends on the amount of traffic protected and the level of protection, starting at $200.

## 3. Geographic distribution

- **DDoS-Guard** has its own infrastructure of filtering nodes all over the world. It automatically distributes traffic across multiple servers. This approach provides more uniform protection, reduces latency, and helps to handle even massive non-standard attacks.

- **Cloudflare (free version)** also has a geographically distributed network, but access to more remote servers may be limited. Cloudflare does not guarantee to block all traffic and will slow down the loading of the attacked resource.

## Conclusion

The choice between DDoS-Guard and Cloudflare's free DDoS protection depends on your specific protection needs, budget, and additional tools.

The free Cloudflare is mainly designed to protect against moderate attacks. It can be a good choice for small and non-critical projects that run without databases or won't suffer much from a couple of hours of downtime.

If your business depends on site availability or is sensitive to reputational damage, you need more serious and higher-level protection. That is, DDoS-Guard is the preferred option.

We cover the details of how Cloudflare and the DDoS-Guard module work in our documentation:
[Install and configure the Cloudflare module](https://www.ispmanager.com/docs/ispmanager/install-and-configure-the-cloudflare-module)
[Integration with  DDoS-GUARD
](https://www.ispmanager.com/docs/ispmanager/integration-with-ddos-guard)

You can also contact technical support at any time at [help@ispmanager.com](mailto:help@ispmanager.com) or via the chat box on our website.