Palo Alto Networks WildFire Reviews

The free version does not have real-time updates. It is slow. 

I have been working with the product for four to five years. 

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is stable. 

My company has over 20 users for the product. 

We get support in the free version. 

We switched to the solution since it matches our requirements and helps to analyze threats with a free version. 

I use Palo Alto Networks WildFire's free version. 

I rate Palo Alto Networks WildFire an eight out of ten. 

We use it for DNS security, URL filtering, and threat prevention.

The global product feature, the VPN, needs improvement, and we need some enhanced features.

I have been working with Palo Alto Networks WildFire for three years now.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is definitely stable.

We have found that Palo Alto Networks WildFire is scalable.  We currently have six thousand users for the product.

Technical support is responsive when we have used their services.

Positive

We were using Cisco for the last ten years and we wanted to change the product.

We migrated from a Cisco firewall to Palo Alto, so it took some time to migrate all the services.

Our migration process was completed by a third-party consultant.

When purchasing the product there are subscription fees involved.

We made the conversion between Cisco and Palo Alto Networks WildFire without any other options being considered.

I would rate Palo Alto Networks WildFire an eight out of ten.

We use this solution to identify whether an unknown file is managed or not. We also use it to identify any unknown file that is executable without reputation. We do this before releasing it to the end-user.

We release the email and the network traffic but also analyze the file. We can do it concurrently before we release the actual traffic to the end user when we have already completed the analysis.

The analysis is very fast. The intermittent is a millisecond and has a speedy response time.

There are some formats that the solution cannot support today, but they are mostly very rare formats. So that can be improved.

We have been using this solution for the past three years. We are using the latest version, and it is deployed on Google cloud. In addition, we do an integration with the Cortex XDR together with Palo Alto Networks WildFire.

It is a stable solution. 

Regarding scalability, 1000 to 5000 is not a problem, but anything more than that, I am unsure. However, it is scalable, and most of the people in our company that use the solution are from our group's information.

We have used the technical support for analysis purposes. They are sound, and the testing system and updates are good. They proactively give us updates, and they are doing a good job. I rate the technical support an eight out of ten.

Positive

We have used different solutions in the past but switched to Palo Alto Networks WildFire due to the fast analysis.

The installation was straightforward. It is a cloud and FaaS-based platform and took about one to two hours to deploy. We completed the deployment in-house, and very minimal maintenance is required.

We have about ten people on our team. We needed only one person to install and deploy and about three to maintain.

I am unsure about the specific ROI, but we have managed to quarantine and block multiple manages on the enterprise price, which is good. We have benefited from Wildfire.

Our licensing costs are annual, and I believe it is not that expensive. I rate the pricing a six out of ten, so it is on the cheaper side.

We evaluated getting proof of concept for another solution and end-user analyzer, but there were limitations to the integration, so we didn't proceed with it.

I rate this solution an eight out of ten. Regarding advice, I would recommend doing a proof of concept first before deciding on the solution.

I'm a reseller.

WildFire analyzes the malware in the network such as SSDB and can help analyze the files transmitted over the network, and can detect if the file contains malware.

There are features such as sandboxing in cloud. It submits malware to Palo Alto on the cloud, verifies the reputation file, and analyzes the malware in the files.

The graphic user interface of Palo Alto is good and it's easy to configure.

Palo Alto limits the files submitted per day. There are limitations with the boxes for the Palo Alto module. In the future, I think Palo Alto will reduce the sandboxing in the on-prem version because the box cannot operate.

In the future, Palo Alto could reduce the time it takes to process the file. Sometimes it takes 10 minutes.

I've been using this solution for three years.

It's stable.

It's scalable.

Technical support is very good. In Vietnam, we work directly with Palo Alto engineers.

I also have experience with Check Point, Fortinet, and Cisco.

Configuration is easy.

For the last three years, the price of Palo Alto in Vietnam has been very high.

I would rate this solution 9 out of 10.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is being used as an effective zero-day threat prevention solution. When a file comes in from a user innocently clicking on a website, then downloading the file, for example, if your Palo Alto is set up in a way that detects what is happening in that traffic going through, whether the file is an audio file, a DLL, an executable file, etc., if it thinks that file is unsafe, it will ask for a second opinion from Palo Alto Networks WildFire.

If you'll imagine how a network would work: You've got your computer, then your antivirus on the computer, then you have your internet gateway. That suspicious file will stop at the gateway, rather than stopping at the computer. Think about hurdles, where you've got these people running over hurdles, and to win the race, you have to jump over every single hurdle. If you get one of those hurdles wrong, that's it. You're done. That's why we're doing this check almost at the perimeter, or at the edge of the network, instead of on the device, because once you're on the device, it means you're on the network.

What I found most valuable in Palo Alto Networks WildFire is that it's intuitive. I also love the App-ID feature, especially because it works out of the box. I can also instantly see all the traffic going out, e.g. I can just plug a firewall in, then connect one network socket to a switch, etc. There's no configuration I need to do to see it. It just tells me that you're sending BitTorrent traffic, or SLL traffic, or you're going into 365, etc. It just does that out of the box, and it's the best thing that this solution can do. Straight away you can see all the traffic going through your network.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire, because it's from Palo Alto Networks, has better visibility on everything, so they can see what's happening in the world. They recently released the Palo Alto Networks WildFire machine learning feature on the firewall, so it's them saying: "This thing's happening on your firewall, so you should do this," and it just does it for you. Rather than relying on a human to interpret these problems, it will just do it for you, and that's pretty cool. I've not played with the machine learning feature myself, but that's something I'm very keen to have a look at.

We do a lot with charities, and I'd love Palo Alto Networks WildFire to have more discounts, e.g. charity discounts, so we can protect healthcare and schools, then other than aiming at the universities and the big hospitals where it's a lot of money, we can go for the smaller schools, too. They make quite a killing there. 

Again, it's just charity pricing, but because we are a partner with them, we can do that ourselves, e.g. we can buy it and then reduce our margins on it to get them over. We feel that it's better to sell the device that's very good at a lower cost, then, we lock in with their services at the end, so work management, etc. Rather than saying, "It's going to cost you this much money, and it's too expensive to even begin with."

I've been a reseller of Palo Alto Networks WildFire for four years now.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is a stable solution.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is scalable, particularly if you pick the right firewall, and that's it: you can do what you need to with it.

With five being the highest and one being the lowest, I'm scoring the technical support for Palo Alto Networks WildFire a four. They're very, very good, but there is still room for improvement when some issues become more complex. If you understand the system, then you'll also understand why it is like it is.

Setting up Palo Alto Networks WildFire is easy out of the box, because you just plug in the cables you need, but the way it works is you need to have an understanding of networking, otherwise, setting it up will be difficult. If you are the right type of person, then you'll have no problems with the setup.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is quite expensive, and this is what puts people off.

The way Palo Alto Networks WildFire works is that it's essentially a service that you get from Palo Alto as part of your subscription. You can subscribe to it at an additional cost, and the idea is it can communicate with all the Palo Alto devices in the world about a file, e.g. whether a file is suspicious or harmless.

For example, a machine in Australia downloads a file, and it doesn't know if it's a file that can be trusted or not. The Palo Alto Networks WildFire process is that it takes that file, and then moves it to the WildFire service in the cloud, so there's a transaction from the firewall doing that.

Let's say it's a Word file or something that looks suspicious, Palo Alto Networks WildFire then detonates the file, e.g. it takes that file and runs checks against it, before and after, and then it sees the difference and says, "Well, this actual file contains a payload." The way that it works then, is that there are attackers or people who are trying to subvert systems, and they will say, "Oh, if this file is running on a virtual machine, like in a sandbox environment, don't do the thing that you're going to do, only when it's a physical thing, like actual hardware.

The Palo Alto Networks WildFire process is a process that goes through all these other checks, e.g. it runs on physical, on virtual, on different types of Linux, MacOS, etc. This file is checked against all these different environments to see if it's okay or not, so this is done off the box, off the firewall.

This is the service that you pay for as part of that subscription, so when it's done, essentially that file is marked as safe, that's cool. If it's marked as bad, then that file, the hash is taken from it, so it's easily identified, then through the Palo Alto Networks WildFire subscription, all the firewalls in the world then get that information within just one minute, if you set it to that. It will say something similar to: "Look out for this file if you ever see it", and then all the machines now knows that the file is dodgy or suspicious. That's what Palo Alto Networks WildFire does.

Palo Alto Networks is very well rounded. They're building an ecosystem: the Palo Alto ecosystem. You've got global protect VPNs and they are the armor that works on the whole ecosystem. They also have integrations, e.g. there are other applications from HP that plug into the device, because it's got the APIs there.

For the deployment and maintenance of Palo Alto Networks WildFire, one person can do it, but it's a special tool, so a network staff that just looks after a server would probably struggle with it, just because of some of the concepts that you need to use. There are specific trainings you'd need to do to get the best out of it, but one specialist could do it, e.g. it's not unheard of.

My advice to others looking into implementing this solution is for them not to be put off by the cost. It's similar to looking at cars, e.g. there's a reason people like Jaguar cars over the Fords. I've always got this mantra that if you have a network, if you have a data network, and if it's going to cost you, e.g. if you look at the fines associated with various industries, and if you're a school that gets a data breach, it'll cost you this much money. The question is: "Can you afford that much money as a company?" If your answer is "No", then you have to look at mitigating it. I would suggest looking at Palo Alto Networks WildFire and saying, "Well, we do these types of things to protect your network."

If you still don't want to pay that money, then chances are, you don't particularly care about security. If you want to pay for that kind of thing to stave off the bigger fine that results from getting a data breach, or getting hacked, etc., then that's how we think about it. Don't be off put by the cost when you're looking at it. Palo Alto Networks WildFire is a very comprehensive device. They are the best firewalls in the world.

There are also other solutions like UTMs and XGs, e.g. if you like Fortigate, but everyone I've shown the Palo Alto to instantly said: "This big screen here: I can see all the traffic going through", and you just filter it at the top, and it just makes more sense to people. It's very intuitive.

My rating for Palo Alto Networks WildFire is eight out of ten. It's not a perfect score because of its cost.

You have better control because you define apps. You just don't define ports. You define apps, and the apps are monitored in the traffic. It is more specific than the Cisco firewall when it comes to our needs.

The configuration should be made a little bit easier. I understand why it is as it is, but there should be a way to make it easier from the user side.

I'm going into my second year here now.

Its stability is good.

It is good in terms of scalability. We have around 25 users currently, and we don't have any plans to increase the usage. The current solution supports up to 1,500 users. It is a little bit overkill for what we actually need. It would probably be good for quite a while in the future.

Their support is fantastic. You can call them and have a technician sitting with you at three o'clock in the morning to help you through things.

Previously, we were running Cisco's solution, but then we got told from headquarters in the US that we needed to change.

If you know what you're doing, it goes quickly. If you don't know what you're doing, it's going to take a while. That is why I requested an easier setup.

In terms of maintenance, our IT unit is responsible for all VPN traffic. We have now automated things a bit, but in the beginning, it was manual. 

We did it ourselves.

The physical appliance is around €3,000 or €4,000, and then, you have the licensing for a year for around €3,000.

I would recommend this solution to others. I would rate it at an eight out of 10.

The backup is the best feature. It is better than with other firewalls. 

The cost of the solution is excessively high. 

I have been using Palo Alto Networks WildFire for more than four years. I would say five or six years. 

The solution is overpriced. 

We use the solution in our company.

The product is the best. It is superb.

I rate Palo Alto Networks WildFire as a nine out of ten. 

We had two 800-Series Palo Alto Firewalls, but as they reached end-of-life, we began researching alternatives. Ultimately, we chose to switch to Cisco Firepower, so we no longer use WildFire.

The most valuable feature for us is the VPN. We used GlobalProtect for the VPN, as well as site-to-site.

It is very simple to use.

The support needs to be improved because it takes too long to resolve severity-one issues.

Better integration with third-party products and services is needed.

The need to implement their own multifactor authentication, rather than relying on third-party add-ons for it.

They have malware protection and web-filtering in place, although they are not as effective as Titan or Cisco Umbrella.

I began working with Palo Alto WildFire a year ago when I joined the company.

It is a solid, stable network solution.

In terms of scalability, Palo Alto is at the top of the market.

Managing this solution we had six network administrators, who are network analysts. In terms of end-users, the entire company was using the Palo Alto network.

When you contact support, there is no guarantee that they will be available to help you tackle the issue that you are facing. Sometimes you are left on the phone for three or four hours before you can speak with an engineer, which is very, very poor. If you have an emergency situation or a network outage of severity-one, then you cannot wait for hours to support your clients.

Palo Alto was the first solution of this type that we used. However, we have recently purchased Cisco Firepower and no longer work with Palo Alto products.

Prior to Firepower being released, Palo Alto was very simple and better than Cisco ASA. Now, however, Firepower is simpler and the support is outstanding. With Cisco, if you have a severity-one outage then it will be less than ten minutes before you get an engineer on the phone to help you.

I have also worked with Check Point and Juniper solutions, and I feel that scalability-wise, Palo Alto is better than the rest, except for perhaps Cisco, where it is neck and neck.

The setup is not complex. When you come from a CLI background of Cisco ASA or any other platform, Palo Alto is much easier. As long as you are familiar with the general steps in the procedure, it is not difficult.

This solution is very pricey and it depends on the package that you implement. There are sometimes promotions on, which can save on costs.

The Palo Alto models that we were using are the PA800-500 and PA830. 

I have seen people in different organizations and different industries set their firewall solutions up in different ways. It depends on the level of support, in terms of who will be maintaining the network. It also includes the level of knowledge they have, as well as their management preference. Some people choose Palo Alto because they don't care about the costs, and it is an easy solution to use, especially if they are already familiar with it. I would say that if they have the budget then this is a good choice and I recommend it.

However, if they are looking to consolidate all of their services, then the option to choose is definitely Cisco. It's a cloud-based solution with malware protection, filtering, and everything you need all in one box. It makes a lot of difference.

Finally, some people prefer FortiGate because the pricing is good and it is simple to use, whereas some people prefer Check Point for other reasons. It's an individual choice, but it should be well researched before the final choice is made.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.