Check Point Quantum Force (NGFW) Reviews

We use the solution as a frontend firewall in our headquarters and in our branches. We use packet inspection, the antispam feature, and the VPN. We have configured threat prevention and content awareness to improve security on incoming email and on web surfing from interlan networks wits SSL inspection. Mobile access through the VPN mobile client is also used from all outside workers and is fully integrated with our AD. We also use the solution to route traffic on internal networks and manage security through client and server networks.

We have improved our performance and bandwidth through the networks. Security is also improved. We have better control over the logs and better integration with our SIEM. 

We can also manage all our firewall from a central management console so each policy is under control and can be developed better. Inline policies help to understand on the correct use of the policies and a more readable list. We can also manage policies in two or more people at once without problems or risk of making the wrong policy.

VPN and mobile VPN are extremely valuable to us. The policies are simple to deploy to the new branches. 

All policies can be deployed and managed in a very simple way. 

AD single sign-on with VPN mobile is very helpful and simple to manage and deploy. 

Log management is also a good place to make troubleshooting and through console manage events. 

Management of the object is also a valuable feature. At every point in the console you can manage object properties and look to each policy where it is used and simply change or find where the object is involved.

Some features, like the VPN, antispam, data loss prevention, etc., are managed in an external console. In the future, I'd like all features in the same console, in one place, where we can see and configure all features. I'd like a web console so that all firewalls can be managed from a web browser and we don't need to be installed on dedicated consoles and applications. 

I use the web console to mange the Gaia software in the firewall and it would be nice to have also policy management inside the web browser. 

I've used the solution for four months.

It is very stable. We have reboot only to install updates.

We chose the solution for scalability and now we are running with all branches with a Check Point firewall. The solution is meeting our expectations.

We do not need customer support.

Positive

We did use a different solution. We switched to improve security.

It was complex to set up due to the fact that we changed our mind on how the firewall works. Central management is hard to improve.

We implemented it through a vendor. There was not a high level of expertise, however, I took a course with Check Point and that was very clear and now I'm very expert on the Check Point world.

We have seen an ROI in that we need less time on managed policies and we have better control.

The cost is high but the benefits are too.

We also looked at Palo Alto, WatchGuard, and Fortinet.

The solution is a good solution and at the top of the market.

Check Point firewalls are/were deployed in various parts of our network to achieve perimeter defense and internal network segmentation. 

In addition to the firewall functionality, each appliance also leveraged Check Point's IPS blades. The perimeter Check Point appliances were also responsible for terminating any and all site-to-site VPN connections with third parties. 

All traffic from remote locations, remote VPN users, and egress traffic to the internet is filtered through the Check Point equipment at some point in our network.

Check Point has not improved our organization. We have observed a sharp decline in the quality of both products and support. 

Over the last several years, there has not been a single week where we have not had an outstanding issue open with Check Point support's advanced tier teams. 

Initially, we had incredibly impactful issues regarding their scalable platform hardware (which is being discontinued in favor of Maestro) to the point we were forced to rip them out due to them being completely unreliable. 

Check Point support has also seen a significant drop in quality, despite my organization even being a Diamond Support customer with Check Point. We fully believe it would be a wiser investment of time to call Geek Squad rather than Check Point.

The only area that Check Point still seems to excel in is their logging. Reviewing logs on Check Point is a snappy and intuitive process that allows the end-user to filter down traffic to specifically what they're looking for very easily and even with little knowledge of Check Point. 

The ability to create filters on the fly in the GUI with simple clicks to various areas of the log is fantastic and allows one to find exactly what they're looking for with very little effort. Note that this is probably the only thing Check Point still has going for it.

Check Point's support, at all levels, needs a complete overhaul. The Check Point support staff aren't even shy about telling you how understaffed, underpaid, and underappreciated they are. Any engineer with a hint of talent is pulled from general support to higher tiers, and then, once they reach a level of competency above that of your average acorn, they leave for better-paying jobs elsewhere. 

My organization witnessed this first hand fighting through the lower tiers of support and working frequently with the scalable platform team. When we switched to Diamond Support we saw no significant improvement in support save for shorter hold times.

I have personally used Check Point solutions for nearly ten years. My organization has used Check Point for 15+ years.

The solution is absolutely unstable. My organization follows vendor best practices exactly and has every deployment vetted by multiple levels within the vendor. Despite this, Check Point hardware has repeatedly proved unreliable at best, sometimes resulting in total outages for our company. 

My current organization has used Check Point for the relevant past and is only recently completely switching vendors to Palo Alto.

All current Check Point hardware is destined for the recycle bin. There is a pretty low ROI.

Most firewall vendors, Check Point included, make the selection of hardware easy enough based on projected usage. Likewise setup on many vendors in greenfield environments is simple enough and should not require professional services.

I was not involved with the initial deployment of Check Point in our environment as it was before my time. However, each subsequent deployment I have been involved in with Check Point was used based on the existing relationship. Once the issues became too impactful and we realized we had no hope of seeing any improvements we began efforts to rip out the existing Check Point equipment.

Do not let Check Point's past success lure you into their current state of bottom of the barrel.

We are using the Check Point firewall for our perimeter security.

The security solution works as well on-premise and in the Azure Cloud. We are using central management to configure the security policy of both gateways.

We are also using a Site2Site VPN for connecting our locations. This VPN is also realized with the same firewall systems.

In order to simplify the process of generation reviews of actual security incidents, we have implemented SmartReport for generating automated and special customized security reports for our documentation department.

Since the security policy of all firewall gateways can be defined centrally on the Check Point firewall management server, it is a lot easier to generate a secure and safe policy for all locations.

Since we can define policy operators for dedicated traffic selections, some of the lower IT staff can easily allow or block services or servers or create their own policy without interfering or compromising the rest of the security policy.

This makes the administration and coordination of the policy a lot easier for us

Since the log files of all services are collected on the management server there is an easy and good view of all actual connections, attacks, or security risks.

In addition, when using the SmartEvent software blade, you get the possibility to have an easy to configure event correlation system, which will automatically fire mail alerts or can even block IP addresses if there are network or security anomalies detected on the firewall system.

This is also possible if the services are allowed - for example, if there are flooding attacks on server systems.

For example, this has prevented our Citrix Netscaler from being taken down during attacks.

Although there is a lot of automation and pattern that can be classified automatically, the IPS systems are sometimes a little bit complicated, and doing the fine-tuning in over 20,000 patterns is hard to do. This has been improved in the last versions, however, it can still be made a little bit better. 

For example, the automatic classification of which pattern should be activated is very simple yet lacks some special configuration options (for example if you want to have more than one classification pattern for the activation).

The HTTPS inspection is very tricky, too. Since there are a lot of applications that are using certificate pinning, most of the SSL traffic (especially to the big cloud provider) must pass without inspection.

Since attackers also use these clouds, there is a problem in getting your security definitions to work.

Of course, this is not a Check Point-specific problem and rather a problem in the HTTPS inspection itself.

There is the need to know which sites are accessed by our staff and to get the visited URLs, to get the internal security policy working. The SSL classification feature of Check Point is a good intention, yet not as good as needed.

I've used the solution for more than ten years.

We do not have any problems with stability.

There is a hardware solution for every type of throughput. It is very good that in the datasheets you get the throughput of the different types of network traffic.

It is better not to choose solutions bigger than needed, or to have some resources left over.

Most of the support calls are answered very quickly. However, if you have a problem and you have to get development involved, the response gets slower.

Most of the time, you will find all necessary information in the Support Center or on the collaboration sites.

Neutral

We were using Cisco firewalls before. We had the need to implement Universal Threat Protection and the configuration of the Firepower system of Cisco was more complicated than the integrated policy configuration of Check Point.

The setup is straightforward. The documentation is very good.

We have implemented it completely in-house.

ROI is really hard to pinpoint. However, if we were using another security solution, our personal efforts to maintain it would double.

It is very hard to compare different firewall solutions and get a comparable price. Check Point tends to be very expansive, however, if you have a deeper look at other vendors, the costs are almost the same.

Due to the good integration and central management, Check Point is easier to maintain than other solutions.

In addition, there are good small office boxes from CheckPoint with a very good price - the features of these boxes are enough for small enterprises or branch offices.

We have evaluated Cisco Firepower and the FortiGate firewall solutions in the past.

The solution protects our internal network (traffic between VLANS) and also is used as a perimeter firewall in our on-premise and cloud environments. Also, we use functionalities such as IPS, ABOT, AV, VPN, and mobile access.

We have about 200 small branches distributed all over the world protected with 1,430 devices and connected via VPN to AWS Cloud Guard and Check Point firewall.

We also have endpoint protection in about 500 devices with firewalls, antimalware, antibot, anti-ransomware, threat emulation and prevention enabled, and also port control.

We have NGTX blades so that we have protection against known and unknown attacks (zero-day). In terms of protection, we passed from none to one of the most advanced protections in the market. 

Regarding endpoints, we can see a lot of prevented attacks and phishing attempts every day. We can see the whole solution running in our environment correctly.

We gained a lot of visibility of traffic patterns, destinations, and use of network (internal and external) resources due to the logs and views within the Smartconsole.

The centrally managed firewalls are great. We can save a lot of configuration time in configuration tasks. We have deployed about 200 devices in record time due to the fact that we use a unique policy for almost all of them.

Logs, Views and Reports are the most detailed compared to other vendors (FortiGate, etc.) We can see a lot of detail in the logs and also we can configure any report we need without any problem and in two clicks.

We can see that, for IPS signatures, we have updates every day, sometimes twice a day, so we see a lot of effort from the vendor. They really try to protect our environment from known attacks and vulnerabilities.

We try to not depend of the SMS application and leave it as a web application. Sometimes it takes a long time to authenticate and open correctly. It's a windows application, so you need a machine to install the application on.

If you have the standard support level, sometimes they take a long time to understand or even give you a solution or good workaround to a problematic situation. We had a problem in the past with a VPN blade that lead some devices to flap the VPN up and down. That case lasted 6 months as we were jumping between Check Point's internal departments in order to find a solution on our problem.

I've used the solution for eight years.

We are very happy regarding the stability. In last year, we only have had three problems regarding software bugs or stability problems.

They have a solution called Maestro where you can add devices in 10 minutes to scale the solution without doing a lot of configuration.

In our environment, we have a classic deployment so it's not as easy to scale; you need to do some configuration and have a maintenance window in which to do it. 

We have the standard support service. I can't say anything too bad and nothing too good. It's normal. Regarding customer service at the local office, I can say that it is very good. They have helped us a lot in deploying some complex characteristics without cost.

Neutral

We have Cisco, however, that's for networking and not security. 

The installation was done by a partner, however, it was very straightforward.

The product was implemented by a partner and their expertise was very good.

There are a lot of licenses for almost every feature, therefore, it's possible to buy only the licenses needed and not a bundle that would have unused features. That leads to savings in costs.

We have evaluated FortiGate, and we saw that it was more user-friendly, however, some characteristics we needed in regards to complex VPN deployments were only available from Check Point.

Check Point Security Gateway GAIA R80.30 is used as our secure gateway firewall. We have configured two gateways as active-passive in cluster mode. 

We also use R80.30 as our security management server to configure the policies on the firewall. We use it primarily to control traffic and secure our network perimeter against unknown attacks. The rules and policies for the SSL VPN connections are configured on the mobile access blade. We use the policies to segregate and filter the traffic flow.

This is for a bank environment.

A traditional firewall provides a stable inspection of network traffic. It allows or blocks traffic based on state, port, and protocol, and filters traffic based on administrator-defined rules.

A next-generation firewall (NGFW) does this, and so much more. In addition to access control, NGFWs can block modern threats such as advanced malware and application-layer attacks. According to Gartner's definition, a next-generation firewall must include:

• Standard firewall capabilities like stateful inspection
• Integrated intrusion prevention
• Application awareness and control to see and block risky apps
• Threat intelligence sources
• Techniques to address evolving security threats

Check Point Endpoint anti-malware benefits include:

• Improves user productivity and frees up system resources
• The industry’s fastest malware and anti-virus scan and boot time
• The smallest memory and disk footprints
• A single-console centralized management
• Prevention of malware from accessing endpoints with a single scan
• Malware identified using signatures, behavior blockers, heuristic analysis
  
• Protection automatically updated with optional Program Advisor Service
• A knowledge base of more than one million trusted or suspicious programs
• Integrated into Check Point Software Blade Architecture
• Flexible licensing options—annual or perpetual
• Centrally managed and deployed
• Activate anti-malware and application control on any Check Point security gateway

Almost all organizations are using cloud computing, and the vast majority are using a hybrid cloud deployment. Private and public cloud deployments have different security requirements, and it is necessary for an organization to be able to enforce consistent security policies across cloud-based environments hosted by multiple vendors. 

The firewall should be easily deployable and scalable in any major cloud environment and enable an organization’s security team to manage all of its security settings from a single console.

I've used the solution for five years.

Check Point is a very stable solution.

It is good in terms of scalability.

From the start, we have been using Check Point.

We would adivse users to install Check Point NGFW. The setup cost is simple and it is not too much. The license fits most budgets.

We also evaluated Cisco and Fortinet.

It is a bit expensive according to the required blades but it is a platform that is worth having as security in a corporate.

I have worked for several years with the Check Point platform (NGFW) and it is by far the most stable in hardware and software.

It is a very friendly platform and easy to configure. It is true that it is a bit expensive (according to the required blades), however, it is a platform that is worth having as security in a corporate environment. 

I've used the solution for more than five years.

I use the NGFW as a Firewalling device, for VPN tunneling, and for virtual patching. My environment is a two-tier network environment. I also use the Check Point NGFW as an IPS.

It really has improved my organization in terms of protecting my network against intrusion and zero days. I have been able to explicitly configure the blocking of certain attack vectors using Check Point NGFW.

The firewalling feature and the VPN functionality are excellent. With the firewalling functionality, I have been able to ward off intrusion from outside the network. With the VPN functionality, I have been able to allow secure remote connections from external customers and staff. 

CheckPoint would do good to add new features such as UEBA(User and Entity Behavior Analytics). 

They should also improve on the effectiveness of their antivirus. It should be more effective than competitors.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

I have been using Check Point NGFW for five years.

The product is very stable with no crashing or configuration corruption.

The solution is highly scalable and responsive.

The vendor is very professional and has the know-how.

Positive

I used to use the Cisco ASA 5500 series firewalling device.

The initial setup was straightforward.

The product was implemented through a third-party vendor.

We saw an ROI within one year.

It is very competitive relative to others on the market.

I was shown the POC and I fell in love with the fact that the Check Point NGFW has a GUI that allows for easy configuration. It also does firewalls very well. Therefore, I did not look at other options.

It is an awesome product!

We use five NGFWs for four of our sites, with our primary site having an active/backup HA pair. All sites are running anti-virus/malware/bots as well as HTTPS Inspection, IPS/IDS, threat emulation, application filtering, and identity awareness. These are our first line of defense at the perimeter of our network and we have seen a decrease in the number of detections on our endpoints. We've also implemented these firewalls to handle our external VPN connections from remote clients. We've had a few small hiccups, however, there was nothing Check Point support wasn't able to resolve.

This solution has improved our organization by allowing us to use one management point where everyone can see the current state, future changes, and logging for our perimeter. We've been able to streamline our staff to use one primary and two backup users for support. Previously, we did not have a good way to allow Remote Users to VPN directly to our network. Once we implemented and worked with Check Point, they showed us what their solution was capable of and worked with us to allow 300 remote workers to connect to our network and share policies. 

We've found threat emulation, application control (with identity awareness), and HTTPS inspection to be the most valuable aspects. It allows managers the flexibility to grant access to high-risk sites based on groups/roles and yet still be protected with threat emulation and HTTPS inspection. We've seen the rate of detection on our endpoints plummet. 

I've found that, over the last 4 years, they have constantly improved the user interface (SmartConsole) as they have moved away from four Control panels for different functions and are constantly adding new features with no impact on our availability during upgrades.

The improvement could come from better monitoring of traffic data in and out of the firewall. I'd also like to see more built-in automation in regards to activity against the firewall to trigger an automatic response for a period of time.

There is currently no way to allow a user to have access for X period of time. I also find that keeping up with the IPS additions to be a three-stage process which includes having to go to email to see new updates, reviewing those updates on the firewall, and then making necessary changes. I would like to see these new IPS updates shown as a notification when I log in (as an alert) so I can review and modify from one pane.

I have been using this solution for four years, however, they've been installed for six years at our company.

In the four years I have worked on the five firewalls we have not had any downtime caused by stability issues. We've had more issues with our ISP/people hitting the ISP equipment, for example there have been three accidents at the near by intersection that has damage the network cabinet or digging has cut the line.

We haven't had any issues where the Firewall has had a memory leak, rebooted, corrupted or had a NIC fail. 

Our team didn't account for a vast increase in workload as new features were added to our firewall (HTTPS inspection, threat emulation, etc.) and therefore we bought the lowest tier for what we thought we would need. We've found that this is a little too strenuous on our gateway and are working on purchasing more powerful firewalls based on the recommendation of our local Check Point engineer.  

I've always been able to get in contact with Check Point at the right level within their SLA. Everyone has been helpful with tickets requiring escalation.

Positive

I have not been here while a different solution has been used. We do use a separate brand of firewall internally to prevent an exploit against Check Point, allowing someone to penetrate the perimeter and the internal firewall containers.

I was not involved with the initial setup. That said, I have brought up three new sites, and adding a new firewall to our infrastructure has gone off without a hitch.

We handled the implementation in-house.

Check Point Firewalls are more expensive from what I have seen compared to the competition and the yearly licensing does periodically increase. We've seen an increase of 8% over one year (new features were wrapped into the license). 

I was not involved with the evaluation process; I was told that Cisco Firewalls and SonicWall were evaluated at that time.

You're paying a premium price, for what is a premium product and support. I have opened several tickets with their support team and have had excellent service each time.