Check Point Cloud Firewall (formerly CloudGuard Network Security) Reviews

My main use case for Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is network security for my network tunnel.

I have additional examples about my main use cases; it helps us with overall network security.

Check Point Cloud Guard provides a unified security management platform for consistent policy enforcement across all environments. Which makes scalability easy & decreases overall TSO.

The best features Check Point CloudGuard Network Security offers include automation of network security and unified security management, which stand out to me because they streamline our operations.

The automation and unified security management have helped me significantly; it saves me eighty percent of the time and reduces errors.

Check Point CloudGuard Network Security has positively impacted my organization, leading to better productivity. It has increased our productivity.

It increased productivity by allowing my team to spend less time on manual tasks, which helps us to focus on other projects.

Check Point CloudGuard Network Security can make deployment and configuration less complex.

I have been using Check Point CloudGuard Network Security for around one year.

Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is stable.

The scalability of Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is good.

The customer support is good.

I would rate the customer support an eight on a scale of one to ten.

I did not previously use any other solution like this.

The initial setup with Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is straightforward, with no complications.

I am still calculating the return on investment; it has only been one year, so there are no answers right now.

My experience with pricing, setup costs, and licensing is satisfactory.

I did not evaluate other options before choosing Check Point CloudGuard Network Security.

My thoughts about the metering and billing experience are that it's fair and okay, though not very clear.

My advice to others looking into using Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is to go for it.

I chose that number because of the performance.

I have no additional thoughts about Check Point CloudGuard Network Security before we wrap up.

On a scale of one to ten, I rate Check Point CloudGuard Network Security an eight.

We protect the cloud by uploading environments to the cloud and making the developments over the cloud.

We used to have an on-prem setup, and the implementation of the new one came naturally since it looks like the previous setup. I know the places for making configurations. 

I am only using the basic protection for the cloud, like a regular firewall, and I find it very useful. 

I feel safe deploying Check Point, and the security lets me sleep well at night. It made a major impact since we have to secure the cloud, so all of our projects had to be protected. We never thought about going to the cloud without security.

CloudGuard Network Security provides us with unified security management across hybrid clouds as well as on-premise. If anything looks wrong, I can get the logs from the same place for all the networks. The visibility is great.

It's helped us reduce organizational risk. 

CloudGuard Network Security has had a major impact on our confidence in Security cloud deployments and migrations. We have to secure the cloud. All of our projects have to be protected. That's the the impact. We never thought about going to the cloud without security. 

It should be more agile, as it seems to me that they took their on-prem devices and uploaded them to the cloud. Every time we need a new interface or something like that, we need to make major changes. This is a problem. 

When we try to install a new lab, it appears we need to reinstall the firewall because the interfaces were missing. This took a lot of time, and we had to use the professional service again. I believe this is the point that Check Point should improve.

I have used the solution for almost two years.

The solution is very stable. I can honestly say that I trust it.

On-prem, we are using Maestro, and the scalability is great.

I enjoyed support very much. We are getting premier support. It is amazing. My experience with them was excellent.

Positive

We tried the biggest competitors in Europe. We found that although they are more ready for the cloud, we am more comfortable using CloudGuard. It's easier to use since we come from the Check Point on-prem devices. I understand the menus and configuration. It comes naturally. In comparison, in terms of identifying threats, this solution is more or less the same as others. HOwever, this has more flexibility, We could use the same product and extend it right to the cloud. The deployment was very natural. 

We use Azure and GCP clouds. We used an integrator since we were new to the cloud. We used an integrator. The deployment took one day.

I used Check Point professional integrator. The experience was excellent. The person was very professional. 

The ROI is safety. I feel secure when I deploy Check Point. 

Basically, the pricing is the same compared to competitors. They are all in the same range.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten. We've had some problems adding new interfaces in new environments, we do run into issues. For example, when we tried to install a new lab, it appeared that we needed to reinstall the firewall as the interfaces were missing. We had to reinstall, and it took a lot of time, and we had to use the professional integrator again.

We primarily use the solution for protecting the network perimeter and monitoring incoming and outgoing packets. Over the years, the product has evolved significantly by inspecting HTTPS and IPS and having antivirus and anti-bot capabilities. It has been interesting to observe how Check Point keeps pace with global security challenges and addresses them efficiently through policies on CloudGuard gateways.

In addition to blocking attacks and protecting the network, we benefit from the visibility into the logs, the simplicity, and the accuracy of reaching the events. All the capabilities are inside the solution. Unlike its competitors, it does not require extra licenses. It is well-integrated and very detailed. We can pinpoint the details to minutes, seconds, or milliseconds, and see what is going on. We can also see smart events and smart reports with pictures, graphs, etc. Through a single pane, we can see how our network environment is behaving. We can see any changes in the attack patterns, the number of logs, or any new events, which may give insights into an attack going on. We can also see if a new application was released by DevOps teams without telling us.

A big benefit of Check Point is that the same policy can be installed on-premises, on the cloud, with Kubernetes, with Dockers, etc. It works on huge devices or gateways on the cloud. It can work with Azure, Google Cloud, and others. The SmartConsole view helps handle all the environments with a single policy which makes it very easy. It enables working with a small team. A small team of five to ten people is enough for a global, worldwide network.

I found the access control policy through SmartConsole, which was formerly SmartDashboard, to be very valuable. It deeply explores source, destination, and port protocols. Competitors struggle to match this simplicity and effectiveness. The evolution of HTTPS inspections, threat prevention, and autonomous threat prevention are commendable. The consistent interface across versions ensures familiarity despite minor tweaks, maintaining a long-standing valid approach.

The visibility provided through logs, charts, and graphs, without requiring extra licensing, is excellent.

I believe that presentations on artificial intelligence indicate that analyzing logs via SmartEvent and SmartLog Security Event Information Management can offer insights into emerging trends and potential next steps. By correlating logs related to BYOD, BYOL, and Shadow IT, it will become easier to manage and hopefully mitigate or understand risks.

I have used Check Point solutions since NGX R65, which was a lot of years ago.

In my experience, recent versions with recommended jumbo hotfixes offer remarkable stability. There have been no unexplained reboots reported by customers.

While working with a customer using 561k gateways, handling 140 gigabits of peak traffic was successful. After that, they changed the product but maintained the same big picture while enhancing throughput and scalability. Adding more devices to security groups is straightforward. The complexity managed by Check Point developers is amazing. Check Point developers in Israel are ninjas. They have built a complete solution with amazing throughput and details. With a few clicks, there is elastic and protected network growth.

Sometimes I find that the VPN teams provide exceptional service, identifying issues promptly. Occasionally, ticket handling delays arise due to repetitive questions despite detailed notes. However, overall, my experience is positive, achieving a more than 75% success rate. Issues are eventually resolved through hotfixes or innovative solutions, supported by a robust knowledge base.

Positive

As an integrator and partner, we have the opportunity to see how other products work. SmartConsole itself is an excellent idea, and the management aspect of Check Point products significantly differentiates them. However, my opinion will be biased because I have been working with Check Point products for a long time, but I find Check Point's approach more simple and integrated. We do not need several devices or appliances to do verification at various layers. A simple gateway can deliver everything and secure the network.

On the perimeter of the network, it works as an employee hired to allow or deny based on the policies. It is able to follow the rules. There is simplicity. The capability of SmartDashboard to create rules, receive logs back from the gateway, generate all those insights, and pinpoint the events is amazing.

Compared to open-source solutions, there is more than 95% security. It does not handle only access controls; it has the capability of deep packet inspection to see what is going on and have insights into the intention of the malicious activity.

Its deployment model is a mix-and-match. Sometimes it is better to have it on the cloud because of the elasticity, but sometimes it is better to have it on-premises due to regulations. With the single configuration on SmartConsole, it can deploy policies on the cloud and on-premises. Some customers use Azure, and some use AWS. Having a Check Point solution makes them more comfortable because they know that it is a robust and mature product. It is not something built by a startup six months or one year ago.

I can set it up with my eyes closed, though typing the IP address is necessary. I am very comfortable handling initial client configurations and cabling. Although some view configuration as tedious, the results are satisfying once complete.

I believe that the return on investment largely revolves around network protection. An investment, such as 10,000 euros, aims to prevent costly outages or security breaches, which could be more expensive than the solution itself. Despite views on cost, the value lies in maintaining operational integrity with zero downtime or incidents, facilitating secure, ongoing business operations.

As a partner and solution provider for the last fifteen years, I have distanced myself from specific numbers. However, customer trust in the product is evident due to its comprehensive protective capabilities. Centralized appliances have mitigated previous CPU usage concerns, thanks to multi-threading and processing enhancements. Correct sizing assures minimal CPU usage, even at high traffic levels.

I would rate the solution a nine out of ten. A ten might impede progress. They might relax and stop the progress. They should keep doing a good job.

This solution would be more beneficial for my AWS side, for our applications. The platform is utilizing AWS, so it requires further protection through some enhancements, which involve allocating more resources into AWS. Check Point serves as our system. I consider it a business case to protect that application work on the cloud.

Check Point is one of the key aspects of our security. It's protecting the e-commerce side and some functions on the public side of the website. It plays a large role in protection.

The types of prevention functions, such as the IPS and other advanced features, provide significant value. 

Check Point is a product that doesn't require a lot of patching throughout the year compared to some competitors. This stability is beneficial for my customer-facing application workload, as it minimizes changes to the infrastructure. 

Maintaining a stable infrastructure that doesn't demand frequent attention is important to me. For our security engineering team in the bank, Check Point is definitely a key aspect. It safeguards our e-commerce side, functions hosted on the public website, our DMZ zones, and the e-commerce hyper-converged infrastructure. 

Overall, it plays a vital role in protecting both our customer-facing and internal company infrastructure.

CloudGuard Network Security provides us with unified security management across hybrid clouds as well as on-premise. We can have a hybrid solution which can be managed easily alongside what we already have on-premises. Rather than than have team layers of management, for example, one cloud separate and one cloud on something else, doesn't make sense. 

The centralization affects our security operations. We are already using a lot of Check Point. What they are already doing has been good for us. However, CloudGuard will add another layer of protection for the things we have in AWS. Any reluctance the organization may have for goign into the cloud, or multiple clouds, will be overcome by solutions like Check point, which is giving us a layer of comfort for our critical workloads.

We're confident in secure cloud deployment and migration. We're already an existing customer and we have a level of comfort with the solution. We know it will give us that extra layer of security and play their role and do what they are supposed to do.  

One aspect that I noticed is that we already have a substantial Check Point setup, so management is a consideration. I'd like to have an ease of management. That's important. I am anticipating the introduction of features like AI or advanced supporting functions on the on-premises side. This would be beneficial by providing insights into capacity and enabling me to project future needs, such as enhancements or additional layers for the Check Point infrastructure. Ease of management and reporting would be crucial for capacity planning and budgeting. If I see capacity increasing, I want to be able to plan appropriately.

I have been using Check Point for many years. However, we began doing some changes in firewalls and handling replacements since last year.

I believe it will perform quite well if it remains similar to what we are already using.

There have not been any scalability issues yet.

I have never had to struggle with customer service. My suppliers are really good partners. They always support us, backed by Check Point. Even if I encounter issues, Check Point's account managers maintain a close relationship with us. Whether through suppliers or direct contact, they are always helpful.

I have used previous solutions, however, I won't mention specific names. Since 80% of us are using Check Point, it doesn't make sense to replace the remaining 20% with something else.

The setup cost is reasonable, and many engineers are familiar with Check Point, making it easy to find someone to do the job. Suppliers and Check Point account managers maintain good relationships with the customers and suppliers.

I use a supplier, one of Check Point's partners, to support us. We utilize two Check Point partners, Indiguity 360 and D2B, to assist us in our Check Point journey and management.

The setup cost is okay. The cost overall is somewhat high compared to other vendors, whether firewalls or cloud-native solutions. Check Point may be on the pricier side, however, in the long run, it proves its value.

We have not done a POC with any other product.

I'm not on the technical side; I'm more on the management side of the product. We do have some rollouts still pending with Check Point. 

I would rate it an eight out of ten since I've never had a negative experience. 

There were about ten people involved in the initial project. We conducted some POCs regarding customer security issues we were facing. We outlined ten cases, and these cases were created by a local Check Point engineer in Vilnius, Lithuania, to demonstrate scenarios. After testing all these scenarios, we realized that with certain preconfiguration or suitable configuration of Check Point products, including firewalls, we could effectively address the security cases we had. 

Currently, we have plans to develop more Check Point CloudGuard products, as well as some on-premise ones, and certify engineers. We also plan to demonstrate the value of Check Point products to about five or six customers, along with a local Check Point representative. 

Discussing cloud security and demonstrating its functionality can help build customer trust to initiate POCs and deep dive sessions with architects and others. This business is emerging notably in regions like Scandinavia, where there are more CloudGuard security projects with Check Point. We foresee a similar trend as the market matures and investments increase.

In our market nowadays, a topline risk is phishing. People can just open up malicious email and you can get terrible consequences. We're using Check Point to meet our demands for security, including email security. They have quite good email cloud security in Check Point. We have quite good ratio of getting getting phishing emails caught. Now, there is a lot of hybrid work from everywhere, from home, from the branches, from the main office, from the cafeteria, and so on. We want to manage everything, see how every employee is working, and provide secure working conditions for all the employees.

The products offer low false positives and excellent inspection of phishing emails, alongside monitoring of all internet traffic. These features provide significant value to the customers currently working with us. Combining these features into a single management platform that integrates with third-party vendors would be beneficial, providing a holistic view of all security solutions. This consolidation is essential due to the limited number of IT professionals capable of managing multiple platforms.

The network security has positively affected our confidence in secure cloud deployments and mitigation. When we speak about cloud security and show how it is working, we can get more trust from the customer to start the POC, to do sessions with a customer and architects and so on. Now, we have much more cloud CloudGuard Security and more cloud projects with Check Point. 

This year, I have noticed that Check Point is working on consolidating all aspects into one management platform to provide a comprehensive view. This platform should include Check Point vendors as well as third-party vendors. 

I am unsure what else can be done, however, customers need a holistic view of all security solutions across their platforms, which is critical at this moment due to the limited availability of IT professionals. 

More integration into one solution with increased automation would be beneficial.

Our company has been working with Check Point for three years. Initially, it took about one and a half years to finalize all the negotiations and get approvals from the IT side to start working with Check Point. Then, one year ago, we began a Proof of Concept (POC), which was aimed at IT technical staff and team leads.

There have been a few approaches and POCs, however, I have not observed any downtime. I understand cloud solutions depend on internet bandwidth and other factors, yet I have not noticed any risks due to the excellent bandwidth. I must say, it performs very well, so I have no concerns at the moment.

The understanding depends on identifying the customer's pain points. It often depends on the relationships we have with the customer and the shared information. Once you know the pain points, you know the best way to approach the problem.

Positive

We did not use a different solution. Perhaps my colleagues have tried other solutions, such as Fortinet, but I am not entirely sure. I think Check Point might have been one of the earlier adopters of cloud-related functionalities in our understanding. 

In our market, Check Point speaks more frequently about cloud security compared to Fortinet. We mainly work with two vendors: Fortinet and Check Point. My technical colleagues have been involved in some testing concerning cloud security.

The pricing is sometimes more expensive than some vendors. It's not a matter of pricing, it's a matter of what you get, from the customer's point of view.  

Building close relationships is crucial to understanding the pain points and discussing the best approach with Check Point representatives. This process can take time, making it difficult to rate satisfaction from one to ten.

Check Point is one of the best in the market. I would rate it nine out of ten, as not many well-developed products are available in the market, which is still relatively new. 

Cloud offerings are bringing new ways of working, applications, and security features. It is challenging to keep up with all the changes from cloud providers. For example, Check Point Cloud products are specific, and on-premise solutions offer more stability as updates can be managed internally. In cloud environments, updates are typically automatic, which can lead to downtime or lost connectivity. This issue is inherent to using cloud solutions as opposed to on-premise systems. 

I rate the overall solution nine out of ten.

The solution is primarily used for security.  We had 48 to 50 firewalls for data center segmentation. All data centers were fitted into multiple zones. Each zone had a different data classification. We had the firewalls deployed on several overseas remote sites.

For nearly three and a half years, the solution was doing pretty good security. It provides scalability in terms of the multiple firewalls that can be connected with the cluster as well. It offers us easy signature updates and rule changes. We just prepare one rule and then select how many firewalls you want to push. It is easy in terms of the management. 

The GUI is getting better. It's more neat and clean now.

Its security and the definition of signatures are pretty good. Especially when you use those firewalls for a website, they pick up the signature very quickly. 

Security is based on two kinds of things. One is based on the IP addresses and port numbers. Another is based on the application. 

CloudGuard Network Security provides you with unified security management across hybrid clouds and on-prem. I used it only for the cloud. If you're using VMware, you can use that on-prem as well. 

The GUI hadn't been that good. However, they fixed that and the GUI is pretty good now.

There may be some latency. In the beginning, you won't really notice - when you have 10 to 15 sessions. However, if you have 40,000 sessions and you are running the dev check in the background, then you will start to notice some issues. It's probably under milliseconds.

It's not as organized as a Palo Alto solution.

We wanted to go with the Azure Network solutions, and CloudGuard was a big expansion compared to Azure Dev, which is a built-in dev solution. I hear Azure is integrating Palo Alto as a back-end solution.

I had a high level of confidence in CloudGuard Network Security. We used it for nearly six months and were comparing different products. I'd rate it at an eight or nine out of ten.

I've used the solution for four to four and a half years. 

The solution is very stable. I'd rate the stability eight or nine out of ten. 

We didn't really check for scalability. We were more focused on features. I'm not sure how well it would scale.

We had the solution in multiple locations. When we tested it, we did so across around 100 customers. 

The product was really good, so we didn't really deal with technical support. 

Our company migrated from Check Point to Palo Alto. I've noticed there are big changes in the Palo Alto GUI. It's neat and clean in comparison. The site was easier to navigate. Check Point has the same features; however, it's not as clear. If you are searching for something, you need to click around. It's not really well organized.

We've also used Azure and decided to go in that direction. 

The deployment wasn't really complex. It depends on if you are familiar with the solution and if you follow the best practices. It's not hard to do a POC design. Within four weeks, you'd have the solution up and running. 

Our infrastructure was 100% Azure, so it was much easier for us to deploy the POC. 

It was pretty easy to configure. 

You can save maybe 30% on costs by deploying this solution.

CloudGuard is pretty expensive. Azure ends up being cheaper. 

They are fairly priced. It's not cheap. However, you definitely need to spend some dollars on security. 

While it's rather fair pricing, it was more about us having the right solution for the user base. 

For a few reasons, we decided not to go with it compared to the cloud vendor's firewall. One was the technology and integration itself. You can integrate CloudGuard into many third-party tools. However, it adds extra cost. Also, if we could find something in the Azure ecosystem, we don't need to go for a third party. That's why we decided to go with Azure. 

I have not yet used its AI capabilities. That said, my understanding is that they have very good tools and built-in initial learning capabilities that can help you begin to understand the traffic.

I would recommend the solution to others, and I have never had issues with the product itself. However, we were looking for Azure-native tools, which is why using this long-term didn't work out. 

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten. I'd rate it a nine if I was 100% sure you could control ransomware attacks. I'm not sure if you can do that fully with CloudGuard. 

I use our Oracle OCI environment to segregate our ERP system, which is JD Edwards, running in Oracle Cloud.

Check Point CloudGuard Network Security makes it easy to create firewall routes and so on instead of the tools out of Oracle OCI. It's inside our unified policy.

At the moment, I am only using Network, NAT, and VPN. These are the core components of the system. We aren't using other features. It's activated and yet not customized yet.

It is more straightforward for me to create firewall routes instead of using the traditional board tools in Oracle OCI, which are complex for creating firewall rules. Instead, I use the firewall of Check Point, and it is very easy for me. It is integrated into my unified policy, so I can use it completely as I am used to, making it easy for me to handle.

We can use it across hybrid could as well as on-premises.

It's very easy to create new firewall rules on-premises or in the cloud in the same way, and we can share them thanks to the unified policy.

CloudGuard Network Security helped reduce our organizational risk. It's increased the security compared to the built-in security of Oracle OCI. It has many more capabilities, like IPS and threat prevention, which are available at Check Point. It is based on our security standards. It's reduced risk by maybe 40%.

CloudGuard Network security has increased our confidence in secure cloud deployments and migrations by 50%.

VPN troubleshooting can certainly be improved. It is horrible at this point, honestly. It is horrible compared to other vendors on the market. They have tools where I can directly extract some information on the VPN. In Check Point, it becomes complicated. I need to open a very old-fashioned legacy tool, and operate it by myself, transfer it to my computer, and open the legacy program. This legacy program will not provide detailed insights; it will only indicate if something is working or not, making it challenging to communicate. 

I have been using this product for about half a year.

The solution is very stable.

The scalability is great. It's easy.

Mostly, support is good. It depends. If I have a ticket handled by a first-level supporter who may not have deep knowledge, it could be hard to discuss issues. However, mostly, it is good. Compared to other vendors, it's awesome.

Positive

We're a Check Point customer, and we only use Check Point. 

We are using Oracle OCI for our cloud. The first implementation was a bit hard. We followed the instructions. We had to get the help of support.

We did the setup by ourselves.

I am a long-time customer. I am a technical person, not a commercial person. The technical value is high. The unified policy is comprehensive and helps me to create firewall policies that are shared across all our facilities and plants. This is very helpful for us.

High prices are a concern. It is the highest in the market. However, I like the ease of licensing. It's not that difficult. The licensing is easy to understand.

We had not evaluated other solutions before this product was introduced.

I would rate the product eight out of ten. If it wasn't for the issues with the VPN, I would rate it higher. 

My primary use case is for the protection of environments that are in the cloud and multiple branches and areas that are in the layout of all the systems.

This solution helped us migrate to cloud environments from environments that were on premises. It helped us implement protection for our systems. The fact that it is part of Check Point's overall protection system within some kind of central management system allows us to easily manage and gain visibility on everything that happens in the organization.

The protection is at a very good level. There's a very high catch rate. It has good flexibility in operating and implementing the system.

Protection is valuable to me because security is the most important aspect. At the end of the day we are looking for what will give us the answer at the best level.

It is easy to implement, and it has a lot of flexibility compared to other systems you have in the organization. In the end, this is a parameter that, in my eyes, is very central.

In the end, it saves time. It's all in one place and you can quickly see how you're doing with the cloud environment. It just makes things easier and helps on a daily basis because it optimizes the understanding of what we have. 

Instead of logging into the system by yourself and starting to check, there's another management system that sees logs. It examines the data daily, and it creates flexibility regarding what we want to investigate. It is much easier for everything to be in the same management and not scattered in all sorts of different places.

Check Point helped me a lot to know that I have a solution that is stable and answers my needs. It really gave me the confidence to move forward with the whole migration to the cloud. It was very helpful.

When I moved to the cloud, I looked at Check Point's solution and as soon as it suited me, I bought it. We chose CheckPoint right away, it was our go-to choice.

From my point of view and my needs, I don't see room for improvement. In my opinion, the more it has support for more environments and the more integration there is with wider areas, not only in Check Point's systems, but also with other systems, then I think it will allow access to more customers which is not specifically my case, but in principle the wider the system, the more it will be able to appeal to a larger audience; integration with other manufacturers in other words.

I have been using CloudGuard Network Security for two years.

The platform is very good in terms of stability. We never encountered any issue with it.

Scalability is very good.

Support is very good. The response time is good and fast, and they are also very professional.

Positive

I had help from a Check Point CS and it all went smoothly. There was only one person from Check Point who was in constant communication with us and provided us service in installing the solution, my experience with him was very good.

After running a test against what alternatives exist in the market and seeing what they offer, this is the solution that fits perfectly into our budget. This is a very important parameter for us, and Check Point CloudGuard Network Security did so.

The price was really good, that's the main reason we chose it. In addition, the licensing model was very simple.

I appreciate the cloud network security. I find it to be very effective, and I am pleased with securing cloud deployments.

I would rate CloudGuard Network Security an eight out of ten. There's always room for improvement. It could become a 10 if they had more accessibility to other platforms. Overall, it is a good product.