Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls Reviews

We use this solution as our external firewall and VPN.

The fact that I can perform several security functions in one device at wire speed is a valuable feature. I don't have to slow down my business transactions, and I don't have to inconvenience my users with 16 different solutions. I can have it all in one box, and it protects my organization at wire speed.

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls catch a lot of things that other firewalls may not catch and support more current security practices. We get updates several times a day from WildFire, and the firewalls do a great job of keeping us protected.

Within their domain, Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls provide a unified platform that natively integrates all security capabilities. This is critical because I don't want to deal with multiple devices. I want to do it all with as few devices as possible and have it all work successfully.

It's very important that these firewalls embed machine learning into their core because the only way to keep up with the changing threat environment is to keep learning about it.

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls are the gold standard right now for securing data centers consistently across all workplaces, and I'm using them across all of my locations. They provide a consistent experience for the management team as well as the end user.

Surfacing actionable intelligence right away could be better. You have to dig far to get some of the information. If the solution could surface the two or three things out of the 10,000 a day that we really need to deal with, it would be helpful.

I've been working with Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls for about 20 years.

It is a rock-solid solution in terms of stability. You very rarely have to worry about it. If there's a problem, it's usually because a rule got configured incorrectly.

Across the product line, the NG firewalls scale very well. Within the individual units, however, there are some limitations. It's not always clear to resellers as to what those limitations are. Therefore, as your organization grows you may start to bump into those limitations unexpectedly.

Palo Alto's technical support is pretty good and is among the best. We have called them several times, and they've been on it. Sometimes, it can take a bit longer for them to understand an issue, but overall, I would rate technical support at eight.

Positive

We have used several firewalls including Cisco, Fortinet, and Check Point. We chose Palo Alto because it's the only one that brings it all together in one platform and lets me manage it. It also removes the complexity of what I have to manage and deal with.

The initial setup is fairly straightforward. You put the firewall in with whatever might be there right now in learning mode, and then you can figure out where the holes are.

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls have prevented a number of things from happening. We would not have been able to prevent those things from happening had we had other firewalls.

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls are the Cadillac standard, and you do pay Cadillac pricing. However, the protection is worth the steep price. 

If you're looking for the fastest firewall, Palo Alto needs to be on your list. They seem to be the only ones that perform at wire speed right now. If you want the cheapest firewall, you will be able to find cheaper options, but you won't find better options than Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls.

Overall, I would rate Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls a nine on a scale from one to ten.

The biggest value of RSAC is being able to see everything I don't know anything about. It helps me keep up with where the industry is going.

Also, attending RSAC impacts our organization’s cybersecurity purchases made throughout the year. I chat with my existing vendors when I attend and have conversations with those my team recommends. We then make purchasing decisions based on what I see at RSAC.

We use Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls for cybersecurity and network security for our infrastructure for our districts, worldwide. 

The SIM's ability to analyze traffic and take appropriate action is the most valuable feature of this solution.

It is an extremely powerful solution as it provides visibility into all the network traffic, and offers a range of actions such as blocking websites or graphics, as well as load balancing. It's a great tool.

The solution's user-friendly interface and clear network visibility are highly valuable to us. It makes management easier, especially for those without extensive technical knowledge.

The benefit we derive from this solution is not only its ease of use but also how it enables collaboration among our team for special activities in our network.

Additionally, the reports that we can generate from the software are very valuable.

Using Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls has helped us reduce downtime.

Compared to our previous solution, I believe it was Fortinet. It saves a lot of time, you know, especially running your reports and analyzing the traffic. I believe we save thirty to forty percent.

It provides a unified platform that natively integrates all security capabilities.

It has seamless integration with all our devices, including Mac and Windows, and also with our secret server. Moreover, it is even integrated with the Microsoft streaming application that we use.

The embedded machine learning functions seamlessly and can be easily accessed through the dashboard's dedicated tools. Its ease of use is impressive.

I believe it would be beneficial if the solution could integrate with Google Chrome, especially for students who use Chromebooks. However, as far as I know, the solution currently does not support Google Chrome.

I have been using Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls for five years.

The solution is incredibly stable. 

We have installed patches and updates, and they have all gone smoothly without any issues.

We haven't fully used the capabilities of the firewall, but we purchased a larger scale to prepare for potential future growth.

The firewall is deployed across all six schools and the district office, protecting the entire infrastructure, including switches, access points, and other devices.

This is approximately 3,500 to 4,000 devices.

The technical support team is readily available and very helpful. They provide great assistance whenever we encounter any issues.

There are delays at times, but overall, they are great. I would rate them a nine out of ten.

Positive

Previously, we used Fortinet.

I was involved in the deployment.

We received assistance from the technical support team who helped us implement the project.

We have seen a return on our investment.

As previously mentioned, the firewall is easy to use and has helped us save a significant amount of time, approximately thirty to forty percent.

The cost is quite high.

We evaluated Fortinet as well as Cisco.

The firewall we use is recommended by our county office of education, which also uses the same application. 

This makes it easier for us to collaborate with the county and share reports between different departments.

I'm thoroughly impressed during my inaugural visit here. The array of products and the advanced technology showcased are truly exceptional. It's a great experience.

I plan to revisit it in the future.

Certainly, my attendance would have a significant impact on my cybersecurity-related buying choices as I would gain better insights into various vendors and their products available in the market. It would provide me with increased visibility and enable me to make informed purchasing decisions.

By attending the event and gaining insights into the different vendors and products available in the market, we can make informed decisions about which route to take in the future.

I would rate Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls a nine out of ten.

We started using this solution as a basic firewall, and then, we ended up with URL filtering, IPS, and decryption.

It increased visibility, and we can see things that we couldn't see before and are able to decrypt as well. We can actually see what's going on in our network.

Decryption is one of Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls' best features because we can decrypt by category. For instance, we can decrypt everything except for bank traffic so that we don't interfere with the passwords and two-factor authentication of those checking their bank accounts at work. We can still monitor for malware and other threats that come through a secure channel. It's seamless for users. The URL filtering and IPS are both great as well.

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls provide a unified platform that natively integrates all security capabilities. WildFire stops a lot of viruses and malware that come in from the outside. In addition, when you decrypt the traffic you'll be able to see a lot that you couldn't before. You can then integrate that into a SIEM and have visibility into all the different things that are going on. Integration with WildFire provides sandboxing and tells you if it's malicious content or not. Then, you can do URL filtering for the endpoints. All of this data goes into the SIEM. Thus, it's a really good, well-integrated software.

This native integration is very important to us because of the cost. When we get an enterprise license and get all these features on one device, we don't have to buy five devices or virtuals or set up a virtual or cloud farm to do the five things that the solution will do automatically, natively out of the box. We have been able to save money because we are able to get rid of our decryption software and are getting close to letting go of our filtering software.

It's important to us that Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls embed machine learning in the core of the firewall to provide inline, real-time attack prevention. This is important because those who exploit us daily use new tactics that are not seen at all times. They employ tactics that use applications that we currently use, such as PowerShell. If a PowerShell script comes in and it's decrypted, launched in WildFire in a sandbox, and blocked, it cuts our threat vector down tremendously.

When we go across all the workspaces, it's simple. The web-facing servers are protected with IPS, and the endpoints are protected with URL filtering in the sandbox and decryption. We log all of the MAC addresses, so we block hackers from getting into different websites when staff use a Wi-Fi connection off-site. In terms of securing data centers consistently across all workspaces, our whole ecosystem depends on having Palo Alto so that we can have one centralized SIEM where all the data is. Our SOC can investigate all the alerts that we get from all of these different areas.

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls need better training modules. You have to do a lot of reading prior to watching the training videos, and it's good for people who are really into it. However, often you want to use a video for a TID. You want to see how to do something rather than spend 30 minutes reading and then another 30 minutes watching the class. As a result, I take third-party training classes rather than Palo Alto's training because they are a lot better.

The training should be more accessible because if everybody has to pay for training, it makes it harder for us to get in techs who are qualified to do the work. If there are clear levels and schemes for certification, it would be great.

I've been using this solution for probably five years now.

The firewalls are always on, and we haven't had any stability problems. We haven't even had any hardware failures, and the perishables are great.

The firewall's scalability is nice because you can take a VM and put more memory in it. If you virtualize, then you can scale it out. With an enterprise license, you can load several to get all different points of your internet access. For example, one could do URL filtering just for the desktop, and another one could be an IPS in front of something else.

It's very flexible, and you can use these virtuals to contain all these different situations from an architectural standpoint without having to buy other software.

Palo Alto's technical support is great, and I'd give them a ten out of ten.

Positive

The initial setup is straightforward in the sense that when you put it in it starts doing what it's supposed to do. Then, you have to turn on all the features that you want.

We mainly worked with Palo Alto Networks. They taught us a lot and have been very helpful in getting us onboarded with all of the different features.

We see a return on our investment every day. We have threat hunters who go through the data and tell other state agencies where the problems are or what we were able to stop.

We haven't had a problem with pricing or licensing because we consolidated other software to make Palo Alto more affordable.

If you're just looking for the cheapest and fastest firewall, remember that you'll get what you pay for. Check if the company is able to support its product 24/7. You have to be able to get technical support on the phone at any time of the day or night. In addition, the company has to be able to do training on its firewall, and there has to be a job market for it so that there's an employee pool from which you can pick someone who knows the software. If it's an obscure software company, and they only have two or three people in the country who are certified on it, then it would hurt you a lot because you won't be able to call these two or three people in the middle of the night and expect them to always be there. Palo Alto has a very deep bench, so they can go globally and get you tech support at any time. That's very helpful.

The price is dependent upon how many features you use. If you have a Palo Alto ecosystem where you use Prisma, IPS, URL filtering, and decryption, it's going to be affordable because you will be able to eliminate other software. However, if you're looking to use Palo Alto as just a firewall, it may not help you that much because everybody out there competes to provide a firewall experience.

On a scale from one to ten, I would rate Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls a ten.

The value I get by attending an RSA Conference is being able to see new up-and-coming software. Some products are new to the market, and others are trying to get their product to market. A lot of times, these products have key features that others don't.

Attending RSAC helps to influence cybersecurity purchases throughout the year because we are able to see a product that we didn't know was available. We learn that there is software that does certain functions that we didn't even know we needed. There are some products at RSAC that may be too expensive, but there are others that we would consider because they are cost-effective and have feature sets that we didn't know about.

We mainly use the solution for traditional firewall boundaries.

The solution helped us meet our security requirements.

The fact that the Next-Gen firewalls are integrated with identity is the best. It gives us the ability to track what an individual is doing and helps us provide access to only what they need in order to do their job.

Because we want to free up our operators from the routine tasks of investigations, it's important to us that Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls embed machine learning in the core of the firewall to provide inline, real-time attack prevention.

Technical support could be improved. Palo Alto's technical support used to be great. Whenever I had a problem, I could pick up the phone and call and get answers. That's not the case any longer.

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls don't provide a unified platform that natively integrates all security capabilities. It's missing some features for geofencing and understanding locations.

These firewalls are primarily used for edge defense. In terms of securing data centers consistently across all workplaces, that is, from the smallest office to the largest data centers, Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls don't have a strong zero trust model.

NG Firewalls have not helped us reduce downtime in our organization. Because of technical support issues, we've taken some hits.

I've been using Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls for 20 years.

It's always been a stable product.

This solution is a firewall that's a hardware appliance, and that's not the direction the industry is heading. Everybody is going toward a software-defined perimeter. Palo Alto doesn't have a strong say on it. They took what they had for their hardware and just put it in the cloud without understanding what being cloud-centric is all about.

I would rate the technical support a three out of ten.

Negative

Our ROI is that the firewalls have been used quite a few times for investigations. We've gathered the evidence we needed to act upon an issue.

These firewalls are not cheap, but they have a reasonable licensing model.

If you are considering attending an RSA Conference, note that you won't gain enough information by attending one conference. However, when you attend year after year, go through the expo, and talk to vendors, you will begin to see trends. You'll see that what's hype one year is no longer a reality another year. Thus, the experience with RSA is a multiple-year experience.

Attending RSAC has made an impact on our organization’s cybersecurity purchases. We've brought products back into our infrastructure based on what we discovered from talking to vendors at the RSAC.

Overall, I would rate Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls a seven out of ten.

Palo Alto is used as our organization's perimeter firewall. In fact, it is our data center. We use it to protect our perimeter level. The model that we use is the PA-5020, which is a bare metal device.

I currently work in ISP operations, where we host DNS servers for customers and also have a few AAA servers for broadband authentication. In Sri Lanka, there are ADSL customers and broadband customers, who authenticate against our AAA service. Additionally, we also protect our internal members using Palo Alto firewalls.

In the event that Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls detect evolving and rapidly moving threats, we get help from the Palo Alto teams to resolve the issues. We do the level one troubleshooting and then open a tactic attempt to pass that to tech managers for resolution.

Previously, there were a couple of limited features available from GlobalProtect. However, after introducing these new features, the solution has been very helpful for us. This is very important.

We are a telecommunication service provider and we offer many IT services to our customers. The recent attack has made it very important for us to take precautions. Having a unified platform for our organization is an integral part of being able to identify and address attacks quickly.

Most of the features in Palo Alto are very valuable. Recently, in the COVID pandemic situation, we used SSL VPN through GlobalProtect from Palo Alto, which was very helpful for us to do work at home. We use general category-based filtering. Palo Alto is a very sophisticated firewall.

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls machine learning in the core of the firewall to prevent attacks is very important. Previously, our country was not targeted by attackers, but recently, we have identified that there are a couple of situations happening in our country. Recently, there has been an unstable political situation in our country, and during that time period, many attackers have been trying to infiltrate our networks. We definitely have to go to the next-generation features such as the Next-Generation Firewalls.

Having a unified platform that natively integrates all security capabilities is a great feature. We previously used a single management platform, Panorama from Palo Alto, across all of our Palo Alto products. However, Panorama is no longer being supported, due to its end-of-life status.

Having a unified platform helped to eliminate security holes. Between the UTM platforms, and Palo Alto, all features are available in one firewall, so we don't need to buy different products or separate IPS devices and separate antivirus devices. In Palo Alto UTM firewalls, most of the features are available such as antivirus with filtering, which is very important.

The solution is user-friendly.

The pricing of the solution is high and can be improved.

Most other VPN clients include mobile VPNs but Palo Alto does not. We are required to purchase the mobile VPN clients separately. During our RFPs we have noticed that most features by vendors are similar but the price for those features is higher with Palo Alto.

I have been using the solution for seven years.

The solution is very stable.

I'm not seeing scalability problems in my scenario, but overall Palo Alto is doing well in terms of scalability. I'm using ten licenses for V systems and the port density is good.

There are five firewall administrators, two engineers, and three technical staff. In my department, there are thirty users and during the work-from-home scenario, all of them are connecting through the SSL VPN. Thirty plus users in our organization and the request for the service that is in our country, in our broadband customer segment are 1,500 thousand.

The solution is at the end of the life cycle and we are in the process of upgrading.

The support from the tech team is good, and their response is fine.

There is a tendering process in my organization, so products that are technically qualified go through a two-stage process: the first stage is the technical qualification stage and the second stage is the financial qualification stage. However, in the end, everything comes down to finances, and that's why Palo Alto was awarded the tender and we switched from Check Point.

The first thing we did was install a client to manage the Check Point firewall. However, I think the new versions which operate at this time don't need the client. Previously, it definitely required a client, so that was a headache. Palo Alto is not like that, it's a dual-based configuration. Also, when we apply the rules, it's also very easy in Palo Alto. Another important aspect is that Palo Alto uses its own based firewall, and Check Point does not. We have to put the configuration to interfaces and likewise. This is very helpful because in my network, in some cases, we have to have a couple of interfaces that are met with the source, and we have to easily apply rules by selecting the source.

The initial setup is straightforward. I was in the deployment stage when this firewall came to my organization. Palo Alto includes a quick reference guide in the box. For an initial setup, everything is available in that quick reference guide. 

We had the Check Point firewall previously and after the tender process, Palo Alto was selected as the new replacement. We took three to four weeks to migrate all the Check Point rules. We migrated around 100 to 150 rules from Check Point to Palo Alto which was very easy.

There is a team in my organization made up of engineers and technical officers. Working under the engineers the technical officers are responsible for the physical implementation of everything. I am an engineer in my organization, and engineers are responsible for installing programs and configurations. We have a timeline to meet for every new implementation, which is a project for us.

In the deployment stage, we had six or seven members on the deployment team. After deployment, we now have two engineers and three technical staff, for a total of five people who perform maintenance.

The implementation was completed in-house.

My firewall is used to protect my internet servers. This means that the servers provide services to our broadband customers. After taking the revenue from broadband customers, Palo Alto is almost covered. However, there is no direct ROI for Palo Alto in my setup.

We are purchasing an annual subscription for signatures, and categories. Our box has ten perpetual licenses for V Systems.

We don't have licenses for SSL VPNs because it is included in the box. For VPNs, we don't need a license. However, if we use the Power VPN client on our mobile devices, we need to purchase the client software.

Before choosing Palo Alto, we evaluated Check Point and FortiGate.

I give the solution a nine out of ten.

We are currently in the process of procuring a new parallel processing solution. Our current parallel processing solution is reaching the end of its life in 2023, so we need to find a new solution by March 2023. Ideally, we would like to find a new solution from Palo Alto, but the selection process is still in progress so I can't say for sure which model will be chosen.

In the past seven years I have been using the solution, I have only had to open ten tickets for support.

The zero delay signature feature is not implemented because our license is not enabled in our firewall. We use layer seven filtering for our data center.

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls are protecting our data center. Almost all our country's broadband users request access through this firewall.

I can recommend the Palo Alto firewall for other companies as a perimeter firewall, as a data center, and as a work-from-home scenario for SSL VPN, but I don't have experience with it as a managed service.

To any potential new users, definitely go for Palo Alto, don't worry about its sophistication. With all my experience using Palo Alto, I have had very minor issues. I recommend Palo Alto as a company network solution.

The configuration of the solution is nice. During the time period that I have used Palo Alto, I have had only a few tickets raised and the tech support is helpful. Palo Alto firewalls cover most security threats.

We use the solution for all the capabilities that the firewall offers, including proxy filtering, VPN connection, and Next-Gen firewall capability. We integrate the solution with clients that use ExpressRoute, which is a very common and popular service in Australia. We route all our client's local traffic, 10.x, and the client's Class B public address traffic all into Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls. We use the solution to provide hub and spoke integration, web filtering, and for VPN. 

The solution is a fully managed centralized firewall service for both public and private traffic, including on-prem traffic and Azure traffic.

The solution ties into existing services. We offer network-based services and SD-WAN overlay. We use VeloCloud appliances and put the solution at the heart of that to provide Next-Gen security capability. The solution benefits our clients by reducing the number of firewalls required in their organization, which is hosted in Azure. The solution's aggregation gives us the ability to service our clients by reducing their firewall footprint. The solution also enables us to route all traffic, including internet outbound traffic from a client's side onto Palo Alto NG Firewalls across an ExpressRoute connection.

Palo Alto NG Firewalls provide a unified platform that natively integrates all security capabilities.

In combination with additional tools and services we offer, the solution makes a significant contribution to eliminating security holes.

The solution helps eliminate multiple network security tools and the effort required to have them work together. The solution simplified our operations. We only support and deliver Palo Alto NG firewalls as a service. We don't offer a firewall as a service on any other appliance. We chose Palo Alto because of its Next-Gen capabilities and being the market leader in terms of security appliances. 

I like the native integration into Azure AD and the solution is fantastic from the perspective of managing user access and using the VPN client. The TLS inspection is a fantastic service that's offered in Palo Alto NG Firewalls. In my opinion, the solution is best of breed, which is one of the reasons why we adopted it in the first place.

We have had a couple of DNS attacks and predictive analytics and machine learning for instantly blocking DNS attacks worked well. 

Depending on the license skew, we implement the zero delay signatures feature for some of our customers.

I can enable the features I want and configure the policies based on the user and network traffic, making firewall management much easier.

There are some features of Fortinet such as the virtual domain capability, that I would love to see in this solution, but they don't outweigh the technical capabilities of Palo Alto as the firewall.

We have not taken Palo Alto's firewall management solution because it's too expensive and we don't feel it delivers significant value. We have developed our own reporting. Sometimes there are limitations around the APIs and it would be great if the APIs could be enhanced.

I have been using Palo Alto Networks for about 10 years, but not the Next-Generation version. Five years ago, we set up a Palo Alto firewall as a service with Palo Alto in the back end. We did this for Telstra in Australia, and we're the only company in the world that can support the default route over ExpressRoute, using the Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls as a service that we offer.

The stability of this solution is unbelievable and the best on the market. We've never had an outage as a result of a technical problem on hundreds of firewalls that we run or thousands when we include the HA pairs and clusters that we've built.

The solution is scalable and we have never reached the limits. We stuck with Palo Alto because of their Next-Gen capabilities, and we have about 500 clients using this solution as a service.

The technical support is exceptionally good. They have more capabilities in Australia now and we've had no problems. The technical support has been so good, we haven't had to look for another vendor.

Positive

The initial setup is straightforward. We have a multi-tenanted version and a single version. We have different flavors of the implementation and it's all scripted. We can build a fully operational firewall HA pair with follow-the-sun, 24-hour, seven-days-a-week support in about 30 minutes. We use DevOps to set everything up and it is effective because it is all scripted.

The implementation was completed in-house.

Our service is incredibly profitable. We don't feel we can offer an alternative that will give us the same return on investment.

The pricing is straightforward with no hidden costs. There is a cost for the licensing, the Virtual Network if the solution is run in Azure, and there is also a cost for the operational support.

I suggest sizing correctly when in the cloud because the skew can always be changed at a later time.

We've evaluated a couple of other products in the past to make sure that we still have the right solution in the market.

I give the solution a nine out of ten.

The embedded machine learning included in the solution's firewall core used to provide inline real-time attack prevention is an important capability because it gives us the heuristics. The solution uses existing knowledge of the service and how we use the firewall, to determine if something nefarious is being undertaken. I don't believe that we are using the feature to its fullest capability.

We integrate Palo Alto NG Firewalls into Sentinel and we use additional data points to determine attacks.

We use the solution's DNS security for some of our clients.

We use a lot of data points from various systems and not only this solution to determine if a threat is live and active. We don't recommend publishing using the solution. We do local DNS resolution using the Palo Alto NG Firewalls. We're purely an Azure consultancy. We use Azure publishing services to publish. We integrate the solution into virtual networks from a DNS point of view, but we are always on the safe side, and we never use the solution for DNS publishing to the public internet. We are an ISB. We provide managed services, but we are primarily an integrator.

In terms of a trade-off between security and network performance, there will always be a performance lag when doing TLS inspections because the traffic has to be decrypted in real-time, however, the benefit outweighs the disadvantages from a network performance perspective. When the TLS inspections are sized properly, the performance lag is hardly noticeable.

We sometimes work with Palo Alto, for example, to support the default route over ExpressRoute.

The maintenance is all scripted and fully automated. We are always at the current stable release and we update as regularly as we get the updates from Palo Alto. There is no impact, no downtime, and no loss of service unless we've got a customer with a single firewall that requires a reboot, in which case we schedule the outage.

I have worked with many different appliances in Azure over the years, and I still do with some clients who already have incumbent NBAs, but for our firewall as a service, I have always used Palo Alto.

What we find is that clients want to utilize the features but don't know how to implement them or have the capability. We offer that support. Palo Alto is extremely good value for the money if we maximize its capabilities. If we want a cheap firewall, then Palo Alto isn't the answer. If we want a capable value-for-money firewall, when we are utilizing all of the services available, Palo Alto is the best on the market. If we want a cheap solution we can go to Fortinet which is not as technically sound but for someone who is price sensitive and doesn't want to use all the features and functions of Palo Alto NG Firewalls that is an option. We work with Palo Alto for our firewall as a service, and we work with Velo for our network as a service. The operational run cost for us is low with these vendors because those firewalls are extremely reliable and because we don't have problems with the firewalls, we don't need a big operational support team.

We did some work with the NHS Test and Trace program and they had a multi-client solution that we deployed hundreds of firewalls across Azure and AWS, using Palo Alto. The client did explore other vendors that were cheaper and after looking at the operational support capability, features, and how reliable the firewall was, the option was clear and not driven by price. 

I would automate the solution. I would use infrastructure as code deployment and manage my devices using IHC. If I was going for a larger state, I would use the solution's management tool.

We are using PA-820. This Palo Alto series is being used in our separate branch office. We are managing surveillance and internet activities with this Next-Generation security firewall. We are using the UTM features and running best security practices through this firewall. Moreover, VPNs and other remote access security features are being implemented in our environment with this firewall.

It has a very good security database for attack prevention. There are many security breaches, and most of the 2022 security breaches use automation. It has a really good automation engine that clearly prevents new types of attacks. We recently avoided an attack with Palo Alto.

DNS security is super good in this. Its DNS attack coverage is 40% more, and it can disrupt 80% of attacks that use DNS. Without requiring any change in your infrastructure, you can avoid the attacks. With this Palo Alto firewall, we are able to manage DNS security in a single device because it has single-pass architecture.

It provides a unified platform that natively integrates all security capabilities. It has a VPN. We don't need to go for additional security features or devices in our environment. It is an all-in-one solution. With other firewalls, such as FortiGate, you require separate licenses. For example, for high availability, you would require an additional license, which is not the case with Palo Alto. In this way, Palo Alto is completely in line with our budget requirements. We are also planning to go with the higher version of Palo Alto firewalls in our environments.

It has helped to eliminate security holes. It creates a usage pattern with its machine learning and artificial intelligence features. It uses a good amount of artificial intelligence to create a pattern. If there are any changes in the usage pattern, it notifies us, and we are able to take action.

In our environment, we are running a lot of production servers. So, we cannot compromise on security. We give more priority to security than performance in our architecture. We put 70% focus on security and 30% on performance. Palo Alto completely suits our requirements. They have three-tier security. We can see the application layer traffic, network layer traffic, and session layer traffic.

It integrates perfectly. It integrates with SIEM solutions such as Darktrace. For log analysis, we are able to completely retrieve the logs.

The most important feature is advanced threat prevention. It stops most malware. It provides 96% or 97% prevention against malware. It has a leading intrusion prevention system in the industry. It is really good at malware prevention. It ensures that files are saved in a good and secure environment. It automatically detects and prevents unknown malware with its powerful malware prevention engine. 

It has a unique approach to packet processing. It has single-pass architecture. We can easily perform policy lookups, application decoding, and integration or merging. This can be all done with a single pass. It effectively reduces the amount of processing required to perform multiple actions. This is the main advantage of using Palo Alto.

It is a complete product, but the SSL inspection feature requires some improvements. We need to deploy certificates at each end point to completely work out the UTM solutions. If you enable SSL encryption, it is a tedious process. It takes a lot of time to deploy the certificates to all endpoints. Without SSL inspection, UTM features will not work properly. So, we are forced to enable this SSL inspection feature. 

It has been three years.

It is extremely stable.

It is scalable. There is a VM solution also, so it is completely scalable. 

We have about 3,000 users in our branch office. In terms of our plans to increase its usage, we are also planning to go for Palo Alto as our main firewall. We are planning to go with the higher-end version.

I would rate them an eight out of ten.

Positive

In our branch office, before the Palo Alto firewall implementation, we have been using FortiGate. We switched because of the budgetary requirements. With FortiGate, for the high availability feature, we required two devices. We had to buy two licenses, whereas Palo Alto required only one license. It was completely in tune with our budget. So, we had to go with Palo Alto.

FortiGate did not have single-pass architecture. It took a huge amount of resources for each action. For policy lookups, it took a considerable amount of system resources, such as CPU, RAM, etc. The waiting time was too high for policy lookup, application decoding, and signature matching. All this is carried out in a single pass in Palo Alto. So, it is considerably fast and also secure. There is no compromise in terms of security. It is completely secure, and we are able to do more functions in a single pass with the Palo Alto firewall. So, we save a lot of resources. With FortiGate, security was around 50%. After the implementation of PA 820, it has increased to 80%. We have achieved about a 30% increase in security. Even though PA 820 is not a higher-end series, performance-wise, it matches the higher-end series of FortiGate. So, there is a considerable amount of cost savings. We are able to save 20% to 30% extra.

In our organization, we have multiple vendors. We have FortiGate, Cisco ASA, and other security implementations. We have already purchased many other products. So, we cannot simply suggest Palo Alto across the organization. We have to consider the older purchases.

Palo Alto is a good competitor to FortiGate. Cisco, FortiGate, and Palo Alto are the three main competitors. When we compare these products, they have similarities, but I would suggest going with Palo Alto for higher security. If you are giving more priority to security and less priority to performance, definitely consider this. Cisco ASA and FortiGate are more performance-oriented. So, if you are planning to give more priority to security, I would definitely suggest Palo Alto.

Its initial setup was complex. It was not straightforward. It required a considerable amount of time and effort. Migration was a little bit complex because we had a different vendor product. Migrating to this product required a considerable amount of time and planning because we didn't want to disrupt the networking in our existing environment. It took a good amount of planning and decision-making to migrate to Palo Alto.

Its deployment took about a week. In terms of the implementation strategy, we were deploying it at the branch office. We already had a solution there. So, we had to completely migrate the policies and everything else. We also had to identify the interfaces with the utmost urgency. We first migrated important interfaces and made sure that they all are working fine and all the security features are working fine. After that, we enabled all the policies and other features. In this way, we were able to completely migrate in seven days.

It required three network administrators. They are responsible for actively managing the firewall configurations, taking backups, etc.

With this highly secure environment, we are able to maintain our production-level servers on-premises. We were planning to move them to the cloud for security, but with the implementation of Palo Alto, we were able to maintain them on-premises. We could create a considerable amount of production service, and thereby, we had a great return on investment through this.

It is not that expensive. I would rate it an eight out of ten in terms of pricing. Other than the licensing, there are no additional costs.

We didn't evaluate anything other than FortiGate and Palo Alto.

I would recommend this solution if security is more important to you. If the performance of the users is more important, I would not suggest Palo Alto. It gives more priority and weight to security. It has a complete security mechanism with AI, log-based analysis, etc. I would recommend it for higher cybersecurity and IT-related environments.

I would rate it a nine out of ten.

On-premises, we used Cisco but replaced our core firewall world with Palo Alto because we wanted more visibility. Plus, we were looking for features such as IPS for PCI compliance. We wanted next-generation capability, but we had the ASA traditional firewall with Cisco, which doesn't do much, so we replaced it with Palo Alto. 

In the cloud, we use Palo Alto for the zero trust implementation. Initially, we tried to work with the Azure firewall, but we found a lot of limitations in terms of visibility. It couldn't provide us with the same visibility we wanted for Layer 4 and above.

The solution is deployed both on cloud and on-premises. The cloud provider is Azure.

We have about 6,500 endpoints in my organization and five administrators.

One of our key challenges was for the PCI, the new standard 3.1. There's a requirement that financial applications need to have some sort of zero trust architecture. They need to be completely segregated. We implemented zero trust using Palo Alto so that if we are within the same subnet within the network, we have protection.

The unified platform helps us eliminate security holes. We use another product from Palo Alto, called WildFire, which is basically sandboxing. We have layers of products. Because of WildFire, we're able to identify any weaknesses in the upper layers.

We give a copy of the same packet to WildFire, and this helps us identify things that were bypassed, such as malware or malicious files. It's especially helpful when we're transferring files, like on SMB, because it's integrated.

The unified platform helps eliminate multiple network securities, and the effort needed to get them to work with each other. It's a very good product for us because it fits well in our ecosystem. 

Our other vendor is Fortinet. Previously, we struggled with having multiple products. One of them was command-line based and the other one was web-based. The engineers would have some difficulty because not everyone is good with a command line platform. Palo Alto and Fortinet are both managed by the UI and they're very similar products. They work well with each other, so we use certain capabilities here and there.

For example, for some internet browsing, we generally have a separate solution for our proxy, but there are situations where we need to provide direct internet access to a particular server in a certain situation. The problem is when a particular product does not work with the proxy for some reason. This is where we use Palo Alto's web filtering. If we didn't have a solution that could do this, it would be difficult on our side because how can we provide direct access to the server without securities?

When browsing, the logs provide us with the required information. For example, we allow certain URLs to a particular server, and we have that data also. This goes back into our same solution. With Palo Alto, the connectors are built in.

Our Palo Alto Firewall has the zero-delay signatures feature implemented. For the IPS capability, we rely completely on Palo Alto. If we don't have this implemented and there's a new, ongoing attack, we will be exposed. We make sure there are controls on the policies we have on each layer.

Even if a patch is released for that particular issue, it would take us time to implement it. We actually rely on the network layer, which is our Palo Alto box, to prevent that in case someone tries to exploit it. In the meantime, we would patch it in the background.

One of the key features for us is product stability. We are a bank, so we require 24/7 service.

Another feature we like about Palo Alto is that it works as per the document. Most vendors provide a few features, but there are issues like glitches when we deploy the policy. We faced this with Cisco. When we pushed policies and updated signatures, we ran into issues. With Palo Alto, we had a seamless experience.

The maintenance and upgrade features are also key features. Whenever we have to do maintenance and upgrades, we have it in a cluster and upgrade one firewall. Then, we move the traffic to the first one and upgrade the second one. With other vendors, you generally face some downtime. With Palo Alto, our experience was seamless. Our people are very familiar with the CLI and troubleshooting the firewall.

It's very important that the solution embeds machine learning in the core of the firewall to provide inline real-time attack prevention. There is one major difference in our architecture, which we have on-premises and on the cloud. Most enterprises will have IPS as a separate box and the firewall as a separate box. They think it's better in terms of throughput because you can't have one device doing firewall and IPS and do SSL offloading, etc. In our new design, we don't have a separate box.

When we looked at Palo Alto about five years ago, we felt that the IPS capability was not as good as having a separate product. But now we feel that the product and the capabilities of IPS are similar to having a separate IPS.

Machine learning is very important. We don't want to have attacks that bypass us because we completely rely on one product. This is why any AI machine learning capability, which is smarter than behavioral monitoring, is a must.

There was a recent attack that was related to Apache, which everyone faced. This was a major concern. There was a vulnerability within Apache that was being exploited. At the time, we used the product to identify how many attempts we got, so it was fairly new. Generally, we don't get vulnerabilities on our web server platform. They're very, very secure in nature.

We use Palo Alto to identify the places we may have missed. For example, if someone is trying something, we use Palo Alto to identify what kind of attempts are being made and what they are trying to exploit. Then we find out if we have the same version for Apache to ensure that it protects. Whenever there are new attacks, the signature gets updated very quickly.

We don't use Palo Alto Next Generation Firewalls DNS security. We have a separate product for that right now. We have Infoblox for DNA security.

Palo Alto Next Generation Firewall provides a unified platform that natively integrates with all security capabilities. We send all the logs to Panorama, which is a management console. From there, we send it to our SIM solution. Having a single PAN is also very good when we try to search or if we have issues or any traffic being dropped. 

Panorama provides us with a single place to search for all the logs. It also retains the log for some time, which is very good. This is integrated with all our firewalls. Plus, it's a single pane of glass view for all the products that we have for Palo Alto.

When we have to push configurations, we can push to multiple appliances at one time. 

Previously for SSL offloading, we utilized a different product. Now we use multiple capabilities, IPS, the SSL offload, and in certain cases the web browsing and the firewall capability altogether. Our previous understanding was that whenever you enable SSL offloading, there is a huge impact on the performance because of the load. Even though we have big appliances, they seem to be performing well under load. We haven't had any issues so far.

We have had some challenges. There are some advanced features that we aren't able to use, which include active IP authentication and app ID. We are facing challenges with implementing those two features.

Other products provide you with APIs that allow you to access certain features of the product externally with another solution. In the cloud, we have a lot of products that provide us with these capabilities, such as Microsoft. It has its own ecosystem, which is exposed through Graph API. I would like to have the capability to use the feature set of Palo Alto and provide it to another solution.

For example, if we have a very good system to identify malicious IPs within Palo Alto, we would like the ability to feed the same information into another product using the APIs. These are obviously very advanced capabilities, but it would be great if Palo Alto would allow this in the future.

I have used this solution for more than five years. I'm using version 10.1.

It's extremely stable. We've used it on the parameter and as a core firewall in our data center. In both cases, it's what we rely on today.

The scalability is amazing. When you look at the data sheet, sometimes you'll find that the equipment won't perform well under the same load. However, if something is mentioned on the data sheet and you implement it, you'll find places where you have high CPU and high memory utilization. When you buy something, maybe it should be 50% load, but when you put it into actual implementation, you find out that the CPU and memory remain very high.

With Palo Alto, the CPU and memory are both intact. It's performing well under load. We have different timings where we have a large load and it goes down and then goes up again. In both scenarios, the product is very good. The CPU performs well. Especially during upgrades, it was very stable and straightforward.

We have plans to increase usage. We're doing a migration in the cloud right now, and we plan to move a lot of our services to the cloud. This is where we'll either add more virtual firewalls in the cloud or increase the size and capacity of firewalls that we have there.

The technical support is great. We've faced very, very serious problems where our systems were impacted due to some reason, and they were able to provide adequate support at the same time. When we raised a P1, an engineer started to work with us right away. Some vendors don't touch the customer's product.

Palo Alto's support is great; they're willing to get their hands dirty and help us.

I would rate technical support nine out of ten.

We previously used Cisco ASA. We switched because of the IPS for compliance, but there were other factors as well, such as usability. We didn't have enough engineers who were well trained on Cisco because it's a very traditional kind of product that's completely CLI driven. We only had one or two people who could actually work on it. Even though people understand Cisco, when we asked them to implement something or make a change, they weren't that comfortable. 

With Palo Alto, it was very simple. The people who knew Fortinet also learned Palo Alto and picked it up very quickly. When we had new people, they were able to adjust to the platform very quickly.

It was straightforward for us. For the initial deployment, we had two experiences. In one experience, we replaced one product with Palo Alto. In that particular situation, we used a tool from Palo Alto to convert the rules from Cisco to Palo Alto. It took us around four or five days to do the conversion and verification to make sure that everything was as it was supposed to be. The cloud deployment was straightforward. We were able to get the appliance up and running in a day.

For our deployment strategy, when we replaced our core, one of the key things was if we wanted to go with the same zones and to identify where the product would be placed and the conversion. We tested the rule conversion because we didn't want to make a mistake. We took a certain set of policies for one particular zone, and then we did the conversion and applied it. We did manual verification to ensure that if we went with an automated solution, which would do the conversion for us, it would work correctly and to see the error changes. Once we applied it to a smaller segment, we did all of it together.

For the cloud deployment, we had some challenges with Microsoft with visibility issues. From the marketplace, we took the product and deployed it. We did a small amount of testing to check how it works because it was new to us, but we were able to understand it very quickly. The engineers in UA helped us because the virtual networking for the cloud is a little bit different than when it's physical.

We were able to get it up and running very quickly. Palo Alto provides a manual for the quick start, which we used to do the deployment. It was pretty straightforward after that.

For maintenance and deployment, we have two engineers working in two shifts. We have around 15 or more Palo Alto firewalls, so we can survive with six members. That's more than enough to handle operations.

We offer security services, so it's difficult to calculate ROI. But since we're an organization where we cannot compromise on security, I would say the ROI is very good. We don't have any plans to change the product since we moved from Cisco.

The cost is much better. We've worked with multiple vendors, and Palo Alto is very straightforward. We've done many implementations with Cisco, and they kill you on the licensing. When you enable each capability, it costs a lot. They charge you for the software and for the capabilities. They charge you for the licensing. It's very complicated. 

With Palo Alto, the licensing is very straightforward. For example, if you only have a requirement for a firewall, you can go with that. If you want to go with a subscription, you get all the features with it.

I work for an enterprise, so we have the topmost license for compliance reasons. There is an essential bundle and a comprehensive bundle for enterprises.

Palo Alto also has a security essential bundle, which covers everything that's required for a small organization.

The PA-400 series of Palo Alto is the smaller box for small businesses. The good thing is that it has the same functionality as the big boxes because it runs the PAN-OS operating system in the background. It's a very good product because it provides you with the same capabilities that an enterprise uses. It provides the same operating system and signatures.

It's also good for an enterprise because you get the same level of capabilities of the firewall. There are firewalls that are 20 times more expensive than this. However, on a small box, you have the same capabilities, the same feature set, and the same stability, so I feel it's a very good product.

We chose Palo Alto right away because we couldn't go with the same vendor, which was Fortinet. We needed a different vendor, and the only option left was Palo Alto.

I would rate this solution nine out of ten. 

As a recommendation, I would say go for it. It's a very good product. With implementation, we looked at a lot of different processes that said they offered a lot of capabilities. We've used almost all of them, such as GlobalProtect, which is for the VPN capability, and site-to-site VPN. We have done all kinds of implementations and in most of the cases, it's pretty much worked for us.

At some point, you will have requirements where you have third-party vendors, or you have to integrate with a third party. With Palo Alto, you're safe no matter what. With other open-source solutions, they work but you'll face issues, and you'll have to step up your security. 

With Palo Alto, it's straightforward. You'll have adequate security, it works well, and you'll be able to work with other solutions too, create tunnels, and GlobalProtect.

There are people who utilize open source products also, and it works well for them. But if you're an enterprise that provides 24/7 services, it's better to go with a company that has the support and features that work. We don't have any challenges with it. 

This is very important because maybe you can get a cheaper solution, but stability and functionality matter, especially when we talk about zero-day issues every single day. This is where Palo Alto would be best.

Secondly, with new types of technologies, like with Kubernetes or microservices, it's better that you go with a company that's actually able to cope with all the technology changes that are happening in the background. If you have a multi-operating system, you'll notice that the signatures for the attack are different for different types of operating systems. 

For instance, if you have Linux, Windows, and Unix, you need a product that understands all the different types of attacks on different systems. I think it's better to go with something that's well supported, works well, and is stable.