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Idira Privileged Access Manager vs Top Secret comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 2, 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

Idira Privileged Access Man...
Ranking in Mainframe Security
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
231
Ranking in other categories
User Activity Monitoring (1st), Enterprise Password Managers (2nd), Privileged Access Management (PAM) (1st), Operational Technology (OT) Security (3rd)
Top Secret
Ranking in Mainframe Security
3rd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
8.4
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Mainframe Security category, the mindshare of Idira Privileged Access Manager is 5.5%, up from 4.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Top Secret is 11.2%, down from 14.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Mainframe Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Idira Privileged Access Manager5.5%
Top Secret11.2%
Other83.3%
Mainframe Security
 

Featured Reviews

Singaravelu C - PeerSpot reviewer
CyberArk Engineer at Tata Consultancy
Provides full visibility into user activity and ensures secure end-to-end access across critical systems
In CyberArk Privileged Access Manager, I see room for improvement as I am working in the on-premises networks, and now we are also having the cloud-based PAM. So there, everything is maintained by the CyberArk Privileged Access Manager team, and we are only maintaining the PSM servers. So it is already upgraded from the on-premises network to the cloud network. If you ask me what we can implement beyond that, I just need a few minutes to think about what new things, because it is already an end-to-end security on-premises itself. Now, when it comes to PCloud, Privileged Cloud, it is more secure than the on-premises networks because most of the things are handled using the cloud itself. So it is an already upgraded version; we do not need to implement something new. But if you think in that way, we can have a chance to implement our things. If anything could be improved in CyberArk Privileged Access Manager, I think we could build a small agent AI in my team, we could give access to these logs—the Vault logs, PSM logs, and CPM logs. Whenever the system is going down, the AI will automatically check. If we actually implement agent AI in CyberArk Privileged Access Manager, it will check the logs, and if any errors are coming, it automatically triggers alerts and gives the solution. That is the best improvement I can think of because these days, most things are done by agent AI. So if we also implement this agent AI in CyberArk Privileged Access Manager, we can add more features.
it_user814482 - PeerSpot reviewer
Information Security Engineer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
All the features help ensure we are compliant with banking regulations
Top Secret is our external security manager for our mainframe systems It's an integral part of all of our mainframe security functions. It's the core of our mainframe security functions. It helps ensure that we are compliant with all of the various banking regulations, security regulations and…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The session recording and monitoring capabilities are valuable. We have real-time session management ability to record, audit, and monitor any privileged user activities. That is a big deal."
"We are maintaining compliance in PCI, SOX and HIPPA, which is a big thing. Auditors really like it, and it has made us stay compliant."
"CyberArk Privileged Access Manager provides granularity. You can break things down into individual safes. You have specific access to safes by individual or group. The interface is with AD, with LDAP, or with local CyberArk passwords. You also have the ability to establish policies for your individual credentials."
"Enterprise Password Vault, Privilege Session Manager, and Application Identity Management have been very useful for our client environment."
"Security is the solution's most valuable feature. As far as I know, this solution is the most secure system of this class on the market today, even considering another management system like Fudo Security, which we also use. The integration capabilities are very good; it helps strengthen our overall security."
"The most valuable feature of this product is the Central Policy Manager, as from the operation and security point of view a robot that can connect to destination machines, change passwords at fixed times, and put them in the vault, like a person, is the best that you can ask for because it combines more functionality in a single product and solves a lot of problems, from security to compliance."
"We primarily use this product for privileged identity management, restricting privileged IDs, and governance."
"The product has allowed us to improve both the management and access to privileged credentials, while also creating a full audit trail of all activities happening within isolated sessions of all tasks and activities taking place within the solution."
"When selecting a vendor, the most important thing is support."
"In banking, security is a priority, and we constantly get updates that meet our needs."
"The stability of the product is wonderful."
"We have implemented two-factor authentication, which is a new piece of CA Top Secret."
"Customer service is excellent, as any issue that we have had in working with the product received the best response that we could have hoped for, with technicians who have great knowledge of how the product works and who promptly responded with solutions to any problems that we have had over the years."
"It protects our enterprise by providing an access monitor authentication protocol."
"We have an ongoing relationship with technical support; they are excellent."
"It's an integral part of all of our mainframe security functions and helps ensure that we are compliant with all of the various banking regulations, security regulations and requirements."
 

Cons

"Functionality to enable drive mappings to platforms and default connectors without the need to use AutoIt."
"Overall what I would really love to see is the third-party PAS reporter tool pulled more into the overall solution, ideally as its own deployable component service installation package."
"My impression of their technical support team is that it is very bad. The support team's response time is quick, however, the resolution process takes too long."
"The challenge with the product is pricing since it's expensive. It also needs to improve the customization. We encountered some stability issues as well."
"They could improve CyberArk Privileged Access Manager by providing more reports. If I need to know the 10 most-used accounts for this week, that functionality can be made available in the reports."
"Our DevOps team is looking in the direction of cloud, because we are not in it today. We are hoping to build it with Conjur from the ground up."
"The price is high compared to Azure Key Vault. It's the most expensive solution."
"There is room for improvement, particularly with Vendor PAM."
"In new releases, installation is not easy and can take about four months to roll out."
"Make sure that there is a post-sale department in your country. We have experienced some post-sale problems to do with integration of CA products into our systems."
"I'd like to see integration with LDAP's services, because today we have the mainframe and Windows AD separated."
"The user interface could be improved. Sometimes, it is not simple to understand where a certain definition should be defined, and I go through a number of screens until I find where to do some of them."
"I'd like to see that more granular, see where you could get the passwords that are being enforced, but you can enforce it at different hierarchical layers between the product."
"I would like to see better reporting, more emphasis on audit reporting, and better scrubbing of the canned reports."
"That is an area where I have a concern, because I don't see them keeping pace with what we're doing."
"As an IT auditor, the UI is the tough part. From the IT auditing standpoint, it needs to be more simple to use."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"CyberArk Privileged Access Manager is more expensive than its competitors, such as BeyondTrust, Delinea, and ManageEngine PAM360."
"It is not a cheap solution. It is expensive as compared with other solutions. However, it is one of the best solutions in their domain."
"It costs us around $200 per user."
"CyberArk Enterprise Password Vault is a very expensive product."
"CyberArk has been Gartner's number-one pick for the past ten years, so you can infer that their pricing is higher than everyone else. When you are the best, you will charge appropriately for it."
"The pricing for CyberArk Privileged Access Manager is quite expensive, and the pricing varies from region to region. In APAC, CyberArk Privileged Access Manager can be obtained for less than in North America, according to my understanding."
"It's expensive, certainly. But CyberArk is the leader in the market with regards to privileged access management. You pay a lot, but you are paying for the value that is being delivered."
"The price of CyberArk Privileged Access Manager is expensive. There are no other fees other than the standard licensing fees."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Outsourcing Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business59
Midsize Enterprise43
Large Enterprise175
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business1
Large Enterprise8
 

Questions from the Community

How does Sailpoint IdentityIQ compare with CyberArk PAM?
We evaluated Sailpoint IdentityIQ before ultimately choosing CyberArk. Sailpoint Identity Platform is a solution to manage risks in cloud enterprise environments. It automates and streamlines the m...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?
The pricing is reasonable compared to other software options we evaluated, and it is straightforward. However, overall costs depend on deployment size and licensing requirements.
What needs improvement with CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?
While the access control capabilities are useful, streamlining some configuration and policy management workflows could enhance the user experience for administrators. A simpler interface for creat...
Ask a question
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Also Known As

CyberArk Privileged Access Security, CyberArk Enterprise Password Vault
CA Top Secret
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Rockwell Automation
First Tennessee Bank
Find out what your peers are saying about Idira Privileged Access Manager vs. Top Secret and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
917,433 professionals have used our research since 2012.