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reviewer2221230 - PeerSpot reviewer
Manager at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Has straightforward security automation capabilities
Pros and Cons
  • "The solution will streamline and minimize manual efforts."
  • "We have discovered that Prisma is not functioning properly with GCP."

What is our primary use case?

In terms of use cases, we had a single client. This client belonged to the insurance sector here in India, specifically a large insurance chain. We discovered that they had migrated to a cloud environment and had some security controls in place. However, they lacked expertise in understanding the threats associated with the cloud. From a resource and organizational perspective, they didn't possess the necessary skill set to implement a comprehensive governance framework. This client operates within the insurance industry, regulated by the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority in India, which has revised some pipelines for the current financial year. The IRDA also serves as a regulatory authority for Indian banks. As a result, the client needed to strengthen their controls, particularly those with higher significance.
Their objective was to implement a few security controls to successfully pass an upcoming audit. We recommended that they integrate Prisma into their infrastructure. This would allow them to generate reports promptly whenever required and help fine-tune existing policies or guide the infrastructure development team in implementing new ones. Prisma would scan the entire infrastructure and provide the best recommendations. It was a challenging use case in terms of implementation, as only a few clients were familiar with Prisma's capabilities. Prisma is a cloud service that enables the hosting of applications and infrastructure.

We wanted to address vulnerabilities that we identified from a logging and monitoring perspective, which is why we implemented Prisma Cloud.

How has it helped my organization?

If we discuss a multi-cloud environment or a multi-fleet architecture or implement it as a fleet architecture, Prisma Cloud offers comprehensive functionality. It enables us to obtain complete reports or scanning reports from the tool on an enterprise scale. However, this process takes time. Although it is completed within seconds, if we have a larger infrastructure with multiple running instances, the tool will require more time. Nevertheless, the resulting report will be accurate and provide a comprehensive perspective.

In terms of a multi-cloud environment, our observations indicate that if we implement and configure Prisma Cloud with Azure and AWS, the tool performs well. On the other hand, when performing checks on AWS and GCP, the tool exhibits better performance on AWS. It does not meet the same standards on the GCP side, but it remains accurate. Azure is compatible with AWS and shows promising results. Additionally, we are currently conducting tests on the Azure environment.

Regarding the entire infrastructure, whether it follows an SAP model, PaaS model, or a previous model based on infrastructure, our testing has yielded positive results, particularly when using the SaaS model. AWS achieves 100 percent accuracy. From larger clients to smaller ones, even within internal GCP corridors where Prisma is connected, they are effectively protected.

Prisma's security automation capabilities are straightforward. We need to ensure that we have a clear understanding of our intended automation actions before proceeding. I was engaged with a company in the oil and gas sector that utilizes AWS infrastructure. They adopted Prisma Cloud and we implemented some automation. During testing, the alerts were satisfactory. However, in subsequent attempts, vulnerabilities were detected after the automation was executed. I wouldn't describe it as difficult, but rather as tricky.

Prisma Cloud assists us in adopting a proactive approach to cloud security. It provides us with a comprehensive view of areas that require fine-tuning. This perspective encompasses not only governance and threats but also the overall security landscape.

Prisma Cloud helped us reduce manual effort by up to eighty percent. It fine-tuned policies and implemented security controls for the cloud, including threat and vulnerability management. We no longer need to manually review these aspects. However, we still receive recommendations for mitigation. Prisma Cloud suggests actions to take from a governance and security perspective. For example, if we have an open port that is not in use, it advises disabling it. Previously, I or my team would spend around ten to twelve hours a day fine-tuning Azure or AWS services by accessing different dashboards. Now, with Prisma Cloud, we can accomplish all of this through a single console. We simply log on to the Prisma Cloud console and configure the services. Prisma Cloud integrates all the services and provides us with recommendations for remediation. As a result, our effort has been reduced by eighty percent since implementing Prisma. We were able to see all the benefits within a year and a half.

Prisma Cloud provides the 100 percent visibility and control we need regardless of how complex or distributed our cloud environments become. By utilizing Prisma Cloud, we have significantly reduced our manual effort to nearly eighty posts. Having everything consolidated on a single console greatly enhances the efficiency and productivity of our team. Moreover, from both a practical and financial perspective, it is undoubtedly a more advantageous approach.

Prisma Cloud offers risk clarity in real-time throughout our CI/CD pipeline infrastructure.

Prisma Cloud has reduced runtime alerts. I have only seen two alerts.

Prisma Cloud has reduced alert investigation times.

Prisma Cloud has saved our larger clients around $100,000 per month.

What is most valuable?


What needs improvement?

Prisma needs to regularly update itself because there are regulatory compliance requirements that have already been published, yet they have not been integrated into Prisma. This poses a challenge as we have to manually address these issues in our use cases.

We have discovered that Prisma is not functioning properly with GCP. I am unsure if this is due to the security policies being implemented by Google. There are restrictions in place, but from a GCP perspective, the security scanning is quite limited.

The deployment is a tricky task as it requires thorough configuration checks. There was a scenario where we discovered that the deployment had already been completed. However, during integration, we encountered a configuration issue. As a result, the logs from the cloud area were transformed into incidents, resembling an actual security breach. This caused concern among my team, and we were under the impression that an attack had occurred.

Palo Alto offers a different product, and they have introduced Prisma Cloud for a specific purpose, particularly for individuals who are new to the technology. The idea is, for example, to provide a single platform for accessing various Over-the-Top platforms for watching web series or movies. Instead of purchasing multiple OTT platforms, the concept is to offer one comprehensive platform. By paying for a single platform, users can obtain a subscription for services like Netflix or Amazon Prime, without having to spend thousands of dollars individually. Prisma Cloud follows a similar approach, which is perfectly acceptable. Consider the scenario where a client, using Microsoft or Azure environment, desires to use a third-party tool instead of investing in Microsoft Defender. In this case, Prisma Cloud comes into play. However, at some point, they may realize the need for Microsoft Defender as well, which would cost them a significant amount of fifty thousand dollars. To avoid such expenses, the idea of offering a complete package to the client arises. 

This complete package enables the client to use a single tool for scanning, obtaining reports and even automating the fine-tuning process. Consequently, the client can invest fifty thousand dollars to obtain the complete package, rather than searching for and purchasing three separate products, which would cost a significant amount of dollars. The complete package offers the same functionalities at half the price. From a product perspective, it is crucial to integrate certain services that assist clients in deciding to invest in Prisma Cloud. In the Indian market, where we have observed our clients, there is a lack of awareness regarding Prisma Cloud and its functionality. Clients are primarily concerned with whether Prisma Cloud can simply scan their products and provide recommendations. They question whether they can perform these tasks manually or use cloud-native services. This perspective influences the clients' decision-making process.

Buyer's Guide
Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks
May 2025
Learn what your peers think about Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2025.
852,764 professionals have used our research since 2012.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks for two years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability of Prisma Cloud depends on how the infrastructure has been configured specifically for that tool, taking into account the load and architecture of our infrastructure. The tool responds well in small-scale infrastructures, functioning perfectly without any issues. However, in larger environments, I have not encountered any crashing or lagging problems but the time it takes to scan the infrastructure varies depending on its size. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Prisma Cloud is 100 percent scalable.

How are customer service and support?

I contacted technical support during deployment because we encountered some challenges. The support was excellent, and the conversation went well. It was crucial to address the issues promptly because the entire infrastructure was at stake due to its complexities. We were uncertain about the potential impact of deploying a new tool in the infrastructure. Unfortunately, we faced some issues at one point, but they were resolved within the designated timeframe.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

As an organization, we possess certain tools, some of which have been developed in-house. However, it is important to note that no tool can be entirely relied upon, as perfection is unattainable. Some abnormalities have arisen and subsequently been addressed. Our main focus in the previous year was on utilizing cloud-native tools. We are now using Prisma Cloud and also looking at Citrix.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup took some time. It was not straightforward. For a few of the clients we have implemented, it will be straightforward. However, in our organization, it conflicts because we have certain lines of business and restrictions, so it took a bit longer. The deployment took around one month and required 15 people.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

In general, Prisma Cloud is much cheaper than cloud-native services.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We are having conversations with Citrix to evaluate their solution.

What other advice do I have?

I rate Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks a nine out of ten.

We are the aligned partner for Prisma. We recommend the same tool to our clients, and the entire team is actively involved in training on the Prisma Cloud. In my interactions with various clients and stakeholders, I have noticed that some of them are not familiar with Prisma. However, they prioritize security and want to secure their cloud infrastructure. While some clients may not have the capability to use cloud-native tools, based on my observations, most of them are gradually transitioning to the cloud infrastructure and showing interest in the Prisma Cloud.

From a cloud security standpoint, and specifically as an organization, we are not bound by any specific domain. Our focus lies in securing the infrastructure from the client's perspective. For instance, consider a client who is new to the cloud and has migrated their infrastructure. If we do not have any governance measures in place for this scenario, our recommendation would be to opt for the comprehensive package offered by Prisma Cloud. This ensures that in the future or upcoming days, the client won't need to explore numerous other modules. However, it is worth noting that some clients may prefer to use separate modules. In general, we tailor our governance, security, and threat detection solutions to meet the specific requirements of each client. Internally, we provide a complete package.

In the current scenario, where my team is performing the migration for Prisma Cloud or the deployment area, we haven't yet tested the tool. We are planning to proceed with that testing. However, based on our discussions with the Prisma partner, they will integrate some functionalities because, in the DevOps environment, we haven't achieved the expected results. I wouldn't claim it's a hundred percent comprehensive, but based on our discussions and experiences so far, it's still a work in progress. We have conducted two tests, but the results haven't met our expectations.

From a DevOps standpoint, the CI/CD pipeline is still undergoing testing. I'm unsure about the time it will take, but initially, we are testing what we have learned from a CI/CD standpoint and a DevOps standpoint. We are currently investigating the best course of action and how we can integrate effectively. In some of our engagements, clients are requesting the integration of Prisma Cloud to optimize their DevOps area when deploying. However, currently, from a KPM perspective, this task is still manual. From a development standpoint, it will require time. It won't be accomplished in a single day or month, but rather, it will take time. This is because the configuration is still in progress. Moreover, from a security perspective, there are certain areas where we are uncertain. For instance, when considering GCP, it presents a gray area where we have been unable to identify any solutions from Prisma's standpoint. However, we need to determine how to effectively integrate the GCP infrastructure within the field.

Prisma Cloud can scan and monitor, depending on how it is configured. It can also trigger alerts, but it cannot stop an attack.

Prisma Cloud is maintained by Palo Alto.

Prisma Cloud will undoubtedly assist organizations in comprehending their infrastructure and identifying areas of uncertainty. The solution will streamline and minimize manual efforts. Users can obtain the comprehensive report with a single click, eliminating the need to access various services to retrieve logs. I highly recommend Prisma Cloud as it is cost-effective, and user-friendly, although its configuration can be a bit challenging.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Private Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor. The reviewer's company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
PeerSpot user
Lead- Information Security Analyst at archan.fiem.it@gmail.com
Real User
Easy to use, provides good visibility but interface isn't customizable
Pros and Cons
  • "Prisma Cloud is quite simple to use. The web GUI is powerful. Prisma Cloud scans the overall architecture of the AWS network to identify open ports and other vulnerabilities, then highlights them."
  • "Prisma Cloud's dashboards should be customizable. That's very important. Other similar solutions are more elastic so you have the power to create customized dashboards. In Prisma Cloud, you cannot do that."

What is our primary use case?

We primarily use Prisma Cloud as a cloud security posture management (CSPM) module. Prisma Cloud is designed to catch vulnerabilities at the config level and capture everything on a cloud workload, so we mainly use it to identify any posture management issues that we are having in our cloud workloads. We also use it as an enterprise antivirus solution, so it's a kind of endpoint security solution.

Our setup is hybrid. We use SaaS also. We mostly work in AWS but we have customers who work with GCP and Azure as well. About 60 percent of our customers use AWS, 30 percent use Azure, and the remaining 10 percent are on GCP. Prisma Cloud covers the full scope. And for XDR, we have an info technology solution that we use for the Gulf cloud. So we have the EDF solution rolled out to approximately around 500 instances right now.  

Prisma Cloud is used heavily in our all production teams. Some might not be directly using the product since our team is the service owner and we manage Prisma. Our team has around 10 members teams, and they are the primary users. From an engineering aspect, there are another 10 team members who use it basically. Those are the actual people who work hands-on with Prisma Cloud. Aside from that, there are some product teams that use Prisma indirectly. If we detect something wrong with their products, we take care of it, but I don't think they have an active account on Prisma Cloud.

How has it helped my organization?

Prisma Cloud has been helpful from a security operations perspective. When a new product is getting onboarded or we are creating a new product — specifically when we need to create a new peripheral— it's inevitable that there will be a kind of vulnerability due to posture management. Everything we produce goes through via CICD, and it's kind of automated. Still, there are some scenarios where we see some gaps. So we can discover where those gaps exist, like if someone left an open port or an instance got compromised. 

These kinds of situations are really crucial for us,  and Prisma Cloud handles them really well. We know ahead of time if a particular posture is bad and we have several accounts in the same posture. Prisma gives us a deep dive with statistics and metrics, so we know which accounts are doing bad in terms of posture, how many accounts are out of alignment with the policy strategy, how many are not compliant. Also, it helps us identify who might be doing something shady. 

So we get some good functionality overall in that dashboard. Their dashboard is not customizable, however, so that's a feature we'd like to say. At the same time, what they do provide on their dashboard is pretty helpful. It enables us to make the posture management more mature. We're able to protect against or eliminate some potential incidents that could have happened if we didn't have Prisma. 

What is most valuable?

Prisma Cloud is quite simple to use. The web GUI is powerful. Prisma Cloud scans the overall architecture of the AWS network to identify open ports and other vulnerabilities, then highlights them. It's really good at managing compliance. We get out-of-the-box policies for SOC 2, Fedramp, and other compliance solutions, so we do not need to tune most of the rules because they are quite compliant, useful, and don't get too many false positives. 

And in terms of Prisma Cloud's XDR solution, we do not have anything at scope at present that can give us the same in-depth visibility on the endpoint level. So if something goes bad on the endpoint, Prisma's XDR solutions can really go deep down to identify which process is doing malicious activity, what was the network connection, how many times it has been opened, and who is using that kind of solution or that kind of process. So it's a long chain and its graphical representation is also very good. We feel like we have power in our hands. We have full visibility about what is happening on an endpoint level. 

When it comes to securing new SaaS applications, Prism Cloud is good. If I had to rate it, I would say seven out of 10. It gives us really good visibility. In the cloud, if you do not know what you are working with or you do not have full visibility, you cannot protect it. It's a good solution at least to cover CSPM. We have other tools also like Qualys that take care of the vulnerability management on the A-level staff — in the operating system working staff — but when it comes to the configuration level, Prisma is the best fit for us. 

What needs improvement?

Prisma Cloud's dashboards should be customizable. That's very important. Other similar solutions are more elastic so you have the power to create customized dashboards. In Prisma Cloud, you cannot do that. Prisma also should allow users to fully automate the workflow of an identified set. Right now, it can give us a hint about what has happened and there is an option to remediate that, but for some reason, that doesn't work. 

Another pain point is integration with ticketing solutions. We need bidirectional integration of Prisma Cloud and our ticketing tool. Currently, we only have one-way integration. When an alert appears in Prisma Cloud, it shows up in our ticketing tool as well. But if someone closes that ticket in our ticketing tool, that alert doesn't resolve in Prisma Cloud. We have to do it manually each time, which is a waste of time. 

 I am not sure how much Prisma Cloud protects against zero-day threats. Those kinds of threats really work in different kinds of patterns, like identify some kind of CBE, that kind of stuff. But considering the way it works for us, I don't think it'll be able to capture a zero-day threat if it is a vulnerability because Prisma Cloud actually doesn't capture vulnerability. It captures errors in posture management. That's a different thing. I don't know if there is any zero-day that Prisma can identify in AWS instantly. Probably, we can ask them to create a custom policy, but that generally takes time. We haven't seen that kind of scenario where we actually have to handle a zero-day threat with Prisma Cloud, because that gets covered mostly by Qualys.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using Prisma Cloud for almost two years now.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Prisma Cloud is quite stable. At times, it goes down, but that's very rare. We have some tickets with them, but when we see some issues, they sort it out in no time. We do not have a lot of unplanned downtime. It happens rarely. So I think in the last year, we haven't seen anything like that.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Prisma Cloud is quite scalable. In our current licensing model, we're able to heavily extend our cloud workload and onboard a lot of customers. It really helps, and it is on par with other solutions.

How are customer service and support?

I think Prisma Cloud's support is quite good. I would rate them seven out of 10 overall. They have changed their teams. The last team was comparatively not as good as the one we have right now. I would rate them five out of 10, but they have improved a lot. The new team is quite helpful. When we have an issue, they take care of it personally if we do not get an answer within the terms of the SLA. We tend to escalate to them and get a prompt answer. The relationship between our management and their team is quite good as well. .

We have a biweekly or weekly call with their tech support team. We are in constant communication about issues and operating problems with them. It's kind of a collab call with their tech support team, and we have, I think, a monthly call with them as well. So whenever we have issues, we have direct access to their support portal. We create tickets and discuss issues on the call weekly.

Transitioning to the new support team was relatively easy. They switched because of the internal structure and the way they work. Most of the engineering folks work out of Dublin and we are in India. The previous team was from the western time zone. That complicated things in terms of scheduling. So I think the current team is right now in Ireland and it's in the UK time zone. That works best for us. 

How was the initial setup?

We have an engineering team that does the implementation for us, and our team specifically handles the operations once that product is set up for us. And then that product is handed over to us for the daily BA stuff accessing the security, the CSPM kind of module. We are not involved directly. When the product gets onboarded, it's handed over to us. We handle the management side, like if you need to create a new rule or you need to find teams for the rule. But the initial implementation is handled by our engineers.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate Prisma Cloud six out 10. I would recommend it if you are using AWS or anything like that. It's quite a tool and I'm impressed with how they have been improving and onboarding new features in the past one and a half years. If you have the proper logging system and can implement it properly within your architecture, it can work really well.

If you are weighing Prisma Cloud versus some CASB solution, I would say that it depends on your use case. CASBs are a different kind of approach. When someone is already using a CASB solution, that's quite a mature setup while CSPM is another side of handling security. So if someone has CASB in place and feels they don't need CSPM, then that might be true for a particular use case at a particular point in time. But also we need to think of the current use case and the level of maturity at a given point in time and consider whether the security is enough.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Hybrid Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks
May 2025
Learn what your peers think about Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2025.
852,764 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Hardik Yagnik - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Delivery Manager at Accenture
Real User
Top 20
One solution can cover runtime for EC2 systems, containers, and Fargate
Pros and Cons
  • "We have standardized vendor process management, so we want to reduce multiple vendors. Prisma Cloud is part of Palo Alto. We use Palo Alto firewalls and other solutions. Prisma has many features that intelligently cover cloud security. One solution can cover runtime for EC2 systems, containers, and Fargate. We also have EKS/Kubernetes integration. So, whatever the cloud-native solution in Pfizer, we can use one solution to secure that."
  • "The Fargate security microservice that's running doesn't support blocking features, which would be helpful. Another issue is the lifecycle. It isn't easy to upgrade if we have a console in Fargate."

What is our primary use case?

We use Prisma Cloud for container security, serverless function security, and our Cloud Security Posture Management.

How has it helped my organization?

We realized the benefits of Prisma Cloud almost immediately. It can comprehensively secure the entire cloud-native development lifecycle, from build to deploy and run. It has that capability. We are using it in the build and run space, but we aren't using it for secure code review.

We are more dependent on another product for visibility. Prisma Cloud does not have a natural feel, so we use another tool. About 75 to 80 percent of our workloads are connected to one solution, but Prisma Cloud has limitations. It doesn't have agents for them, so we use other tools or other native security tools to protect them. 

When we started, many false positives and mismatched rules were not properly created. We created a more mature ruleset and now have a manageable set of alerts. It's not that much and has reduced over time.

We use different tools to achieve the same result, and consolidating that helps us save money. It has saved us, but it is a costly product. We are also saving some money on projects where there is competition. It's much cheaper, and they have the same or similar features.

What is most valuable?

We have standardized vendor process management, so we want to reduce multiple vendors. Prisma Cloud is part of Palo Alto. We use Palo Alto firewalls and other solutions. Prisma has many features that intelligently cover cloud security. One solution can cover runtime for EC2 systems, containers, and Fargate. We also have EKS/Kubernetes integration. So, whatever the cloud-native solution in Pfizer, we can use one solution to secure that.

What needs improvement?

The Fargate security microservice that's running doesn't support blocking features, which would be helpful. Another issue is the lifecycle. It isn't easy to upgrade if we have a console in Fargate. 

For how long have I used the solution?

We have used Prisma Cloud for nearly two years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We have had some issues, but they were mainly due to the environment. It did not crash as much after we set up the environment, but we had to build the system twice because of environmental issues. It took us a long time, but we have a learning curve on these deployments.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Prisma scales well if we're deploying on Kubernetes, but it doesn't scale that great on Fargate.

How are customer service and support?

I had an opportunity to work with technical support and presales. The technical support was good. They are deep into the technology, but the presales staff wasn't up to the mark.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We have Aqua Security and many open-source tools. Prisma Cloud suits our needs, so it's good. 

How was the initial setup?

The deployment had a steep learning curve, and the support wasn't trained enough to work on the product. They were trying it out in their own lab. It's a new technology, so it takes time.

We deployed via a CICD integration, which took us around two months. We have two deployments: production and our lower environment. It took time because there were dependencies in the infrastructure. It took two to three months to get a stable working solution. I deployed it alone. 

We deployed in Fargate, so high availability and other things were not an issue. The issue was the upgrade process, which requires us to streamline the upgrade process in the target deployment. That requires maintenance. If there is a major upgrade, it requires a lot of planning and everything. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Prisma Cloud's pricing is a little higher than its competitors. It should come down. 

What other advice do I have?

I rate Prisma Cloud seven out of 10. 

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Integrator
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PeerSpot user
reviewer2534448 - PeerSpot reviewer
L2 - Cloud Security Engineer at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
MSP
Provides a single portal to manage all the modules, improves visibility, and saves costs
Pros and Cons
  • "Prisma Cloud's most valuable feature is its user identification capabilities."
  • "While the documentation continually improves, it still has limitations compared to the extensive resources available for older products like hardware firewalls, which have been around for approximately 20 years."

What is our primary use case?

We specialize in all Palo Alto modules, including visibility, compliance, governance, threat detection, data security, and hub security. Our comprehensive suite of services covers all aspects of these modules. We leverage the SaaS security product for advanced threat detection, and for all-encompassing monitoring, we utilize Cortex XDR from Palo Alto.

Many customers store sensitive data in on-premises data centers and require robust security measures. Prisma Access licenses can protect internal networks, but some customers prefer avoiding internet exposure. To address this, we offer gateways that create a secure environment for internet access. With the rise of remote work, we provide VPN connections, such as GlobalProtect, for secure access to both internal and external resources. Customers can deploy multiple gateways in different regions to meet their needs. Traffic flow typically involves a VPN connection to a gateway, followed by routing through internal service connections and potentially a data center firewall before reaching the desired resource. For external access, traffic is routed directly to the internet through the VPN.

How has it helped my organization?

Prisma Cloud offers comprehensive security across multi and hybrid cloud environments. For instance, our ADEM tool, considered industry-leading, requires installation on user machines to enable continuous monitoring of all ADEM-equipped users. This includes detecting anomalous activity outside the corporate network and tracking user online time, providing valuable insights into network usage.

Security automation and EA Ops significantly reduce manual configuration and management tasks compared to previous methods, saving valuable time. Now, we only need to configure a few minor details rather than handling everything. For instance, with service connections and gateways, we don't have to manage multiple VPN gateways; Palo Alto is managed on the backend. Our primary responsibility will be monitoring after initial tunnel creation. We've preconfigured connections to on-premises firewalls, whether third-party or Palo Alto, eliminating manual configuration. Automation is in place, and we'll only need to purchase licenses. The autonomous system further enhances automation for all processes.

Intune security automation has significantly reduced our costs, making us more financially efficient making us more financially efficient. Automation is now highly valued as it eliminates the need for engineers to configure and manage systems manually. With AI-driven automation, we can effectively monitor configurations through a dashboard, providing a complete overview. This automation simplifies tasks like creating BGP connections, which previously required complex CLI commands. Prisma Access Palo Alto's GUI interface automates tenant creation with minimal input. Integrating Prisma MDM and Palo Alto device deployment further streamlines the process, reducing manual intervention. Overall, this automation saves money and frees up engineer resources by eliminating time-consuming configuration tasks.

Palo Alto Networks is a global leader in cybersecurity, providing top-tier protection to its customer base of over 90,000. Traditionally, customers relied on on-premise hardware firewalls, but the shift towards cloud-based solutions has driven a demand for more flexible and cost-effective security options. In response, Palo Alto Networks offers cloud security solutions that leverage its existing global device infrastructure. Customers only need to purchase licenses to activate cloud security features, tailoring protection to their specific needs for internal, external, or network environments. For customers seeking complete independence, Palo Alto Networks also provides interconnect licenses that eliminate the need for a service connection.

Customers do not directly purchase Palo Alto products or deploy them into production. Our professional engineers provide a lab environment for customers to test any desired Palo Alto services, from essential Prisma Access to advanced cybersecurity solutions like SaaS security and Cortex XDR. Once customers are satisfied with the lab environment, they can deploy the chosen products into production. If they encounter any issues during deployment or operation, the support team promptly addresses them.

I have resolved numerous customer issues, closing over 400 or 500 cases globally. While many cases can be resolved within a week, some complex issues may take up to a month. Palo Alto Networks aims to provide timely support for all customer issues, regardless of severity. When a customer encounters a VPN connection problem, they can create a case with varying priority levels. Critical cases are assigned to engineers immediately, with hourly updates provided to the customer. If the issue persists, the case is escalated to senior resources. Prisma, a relatively new platform, is constantly being monitored for bugs. Any issues identified are addressed promptly and communicated to customers. Our goal is to deliver exceptional support services.

Prisma Cloud offers complete visibility across our entire environment, from end users to the data center. We'll have full control and oversight within a single unified portal, eliminating the need to juggle multiple platforms as often required by other solutions. Prisma Cloud provides dedicated applications for various functions, such as SaaS security, threat and vulnerability management, cloud identity engine, and log analysis. These applications work seamlessly together, automatically connecting through APIs once deployed and licensed. For configuration management, the Strata Cloud Manager handles Prisma Access and Prisma SD-WAN. This centralized approach allows us to efficiently manage multiple aspects of our security infrastructure within a single platform.

Prisma Cloud offers SaaS security and data loss prevention as separate features requiring additional licensing. Both can be managed through a single portal. For threat prevention, they provide Cortex XDR, a recent cybersecurity offering from Palo Alto. When combined, we have a single tool to protect all of our cloud resources and applications.

Prisma Cloud helps reduce the number of runtime alerts. Users will only receive live alerts generated when Prisma detects an issue within the environment. For instance, if Prisma Access observes an attack, it will generate a live alert visible in the startup cloud manager's dashboard.

Prisma Cloud effectively reduces the overall number of alerts by prioritizing them into categories: critical, high, medium, low, and informational. Less critical warnings are consolidated into the informational category, minimizing alert fatigue. Critical alerts persist until resolved, and recurring issues can be configured to trigger email notifications for proactive monitoring, ensuring timely attention even when engineers are unavailable.

Prisma Cloud offers significant cost savings for customers. Previously, customers managed multiple firewalls, including internal and external devices. With Prisma Access, this complex management is eliminated, as Palo Alto handles firewall management. Customers configure and purchase a license to access gateways for end-user connections. This eliminates the need to purchase expensive individual firewalls, which can cost billions. While customers retain visibility through a provided portal to monitor traffic, the primary benefit is the streamlined management and cost reduction achieved through Prisma Cloud.

What is most valuable?

Visibility and control are valuable features. Customers desire complete oversight to monitor resource access, both internal and external, and verify user activity. ADEM, a purchasable license, enhances network visibility by tracking traffic patterns and identifying potential threats through a dashboard. Our Strata Cloud Manager platform unifies Prisma access and cloud management, while also accommodating next-generation firewall administration. The dashboard provides in-depth visibility into threats and vulnerabilities.

Prisma Cloud's most valuable feature is its user identification capabilities. By integrating with Active Directory or LDAP servers, it efficiently manages user access to cloud resources. Previously, determining user access required multiple hops through internal resources, consuming significant bandwidth. Prisma Cloud's Cloud Identity Engine directly connects to identity providers, streamlining user authentication and authorization. This improves performance and security by eliminating the need to constantly query Active Directory. Additionally, Prisma Cloud offers full visibility into network threats and vulnerabilities through a unified dashboard, reducing the need for multiple tools and licenses. This centralized approach enhances threat detection, response, and overall security posture.

What needs improvement?

The speed at which Palo Alto resolves bugs should be improved to prevent customers from experiencing issues while waiting for resolutions.

Palo Alto Prisma Cloud is relatively new, with only three years of history. While the documentation continually improves, it still has limitations compared to the extensive resources available for older products like hardware firewalls, which have been around for approximately 20 years. Despite these shortcomings, Prisma Cloud's documentation is growing, and knowledge base articles can be helpful for troubleshooting issues.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Prisma Cloud for two years.

How are customer service and support?

The quality of technical support varies depending on the issue a customer faces. High-priority cases demand immediate attention and daily follow-up to prevent customer frustration. I have resolved hundreds of Palo Alto cases, including critical ones. These cases require engineers to provide half-hourly updates and expedite troubleshooting. A recent critical case involved a customer migrating Panorama configuration and experiencing Prisma Access account verification issues. The initial engineer engaged with Prisma Access but encountered licensing problems. I escalated the case, collaborating with licensing and engineering teams to resolve the API-related issue and restore service. While such cases are time-consuming due to limited resources, a global team of engineers can address troubleshooting needs.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

How was the initial setup?

The initial deployment was smooth due to excellent support from Palo Alto's professional services engineer. They provided a clear overview of our deployment needs, considering the customer's two branches and primarily remote workforce. We determined six VPN gateway connections were required, two in the US, India, and Europe, and two branch office connections. Palo Alto created a lab environment, presented the network topology, and demonstrated traffic flow. Additionally, they introduced the split tunneling feature, allowing specific traffic like Google search to bypass Prisma Access and access the internet directly. Overall, the top-tier engineers at Palo Alto delivered exceptional customer service and ensured a seamless implementation.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate Prisma Cloud nine out of ten. I am deducting a point because of the limited documentation.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Principal Security Architect at Deloitte
Reseller
Top 5Leaderboard
Helps reduce resources, and has great cloud security posture management, but the identity-based micro-segmentation has room for improvement
Pros and Cons
  • "Cloud security posture management is the preferred feature among other vendors."
  • "There is room for improvement on the logging and monitoring front because it's still not as holistic as I would want it to be."

What is our primary use case?

We are a Palo Alto Alliance partner and our clients are Fortune 500 companies. We utilize a multi-cloud network architecture, with the primary constraint being the inability to manage everything through a single interface. By implementing uniform guardrails, we address the issue of inconsistent security policies when using native cloud security controls. This is one of the key considerations. Additionally, we employ micro-segmentation using cloud network security modules of Prisma Cloud to minimize the attack surface for various workloads.

The primary use case that was lacking was a single pane of glass. Additionally, prior to implementing Prisma Cloud, we used to manually perform these tasks using AWS CloudFormation Templates or Azure Resource Manager Templates. However, Prisma Cloud helped us address this issue by providing a unified administration interface. One of the problems we faced was the inability to view vulnerabilities across different cloud workloads and compare risks across different platforms. These were the challenges we encountered before deploying Prisma Cloud. While we didn't completely solve all of them after implementing Prisma Cloud, we did make significant progress in that regard.

How has it helped my organization?

Prisma Cloud offers security scanning for various cloud environments. In some client environments, there is only a single cloud, so the fact that Prisma Cloud can scan multiple clouds doesn't make a significant difference. These clients have a limited presence in the cloud, with few workloads or resources deployed. Consequently, it doesn't provide substantial value in such cases. However, for large companies, manufacturing companies, or companies with significant IT intellectual property in the cloud, with multiple tenants and a widespread cloud presence across different regions and replication, deploying a solution like Prisma Cloud becomes necessary.

Prisma Cloud enables us to adopt a proactive approach to cloud security. It goes beyond providing visibility and monitoring capabilities by offering a wide range of auto-remediation features. It provides numerous security controls and the ability to enforce commonly configured guardrails, primarily in monitoring mode. It is a comprehensive product that caters not only to detection but also prevention.

Prisma Cloud has helped reduce the number of people required to support or manage these cloud platforms, especially in terms of security. So now, instead of needing three different individuals to manage three different clouds, it may be possible to use just one resource to handle all three clouds, particularly focusing on security. This approach facilitates resource reduction, which is especially beneficial for clients operating within tight budgets. Additionally, there's the advantage of having a single pane of glass, where we can access various informative graphs, charts, and reports. These resources assist in explaining technical matters to non-technical leadership, making it easier to articulate concepts and insights to executives and other non-technical individuals. Personally, this has been helpful for me and our organization. The benefits for clients vary depending on the size of the environment. Personally, when we started using Prisma Cloud as an offering, it took two and a half to three months, which was the rough estimate. However, back then, not all the modules that are available today existed. So those numbers might have changed if all the modules were available at that time.

Prisma Cloud offers the visibility and control we require, regardless of the complexity or distribution of our cloud environments. Since it is built on top of these existing clouds and utilizes many of the services provided by large-scale cloud platforms, there is typically no issue with visibility. Regardless of the complexity of the environment, we always achieve visibility. The way we store and analyze the data, as well as how we visualize information, depends on the operator of the tool. Prisma Cloud is a reliable tool that never fails.

Prisma Cloud enables us to integrate security into our CI/CD pipeline. We primarily use it for the container. We have integrated image scanning and registry scanning into our CI/CD pipelines, specifically Azure DevOps. The DevSecOps team is responsible for managing this process.

Prisma offers us a unified tool that safeguards all our cloud resources and applications, eliminating the need to handle and reconcile separate security and compliance reports, with the exception of billing costs and management. From a security perspective, we haven't encountered any other reports for the majority of our clients. While a few clients may have additional requirements, Prisma Cloud efficiently handles all of those as well.

Prisma has reduced runtime alerts.

Prisma has reduced the time required for alert investigation. We now have a comprehensive understanding of the entire lifecycle of where things went wrong or which part of the runtime or execution for a specific process went wrong, particularly in terms of security.

Prisma Cloud has saved us money by reducing resources. 

What is most valuable?

Cloud security posture management is the preferred feature among other vendors.

What needs improvement?

There is room for improvement on the logging and monitoring front because it's still not as holistic as I would want it to be. Especially in the sense that we have different modules within Prisma Cloud, but then the visibility that we get from the output of each of these modules cannot be stitched together. Perhaps we could deploy something like a SIEM or SOAR platform to get this telemetry. As of now, we are lacking that part. So now I'm sure that was not the primary intent for that. It would really make a difference if Palo Alto Networks improves this.

The identity-based micro-segmentation in our cloud-native services requires a significant improvement. It fails to address many of the problems that its predecessor used to solve. Previously, there was identity-based micro-segmentation, but it was phased out, reaching its end-of-life and end-of-support. Now, we have cloud network security, which lacks a crucial feature that IBM used to offer. This is something we strongly desire, as we have had multiple discussions with Palo Alto regarding this matter. I am uncertain if there is a roadmap for implementing this feature, but the cloud network security module requires a substantial upgrade.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I have never encountered any challenges regarding any modules. Occasionally, they do undergo planned maintenance outages, but those are well-communicated in advance. Therefore, I don't consider them to be challenging. Prisma Cloud is reliable, and I would rate its stability at nine out of ten.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I would rate the scalability of Prisma Cloud as an eight out of ten. The only concern lies not with Prisma itself, but rather with the existing client environment. Many clients have flawed infrastructures, making it challenging to achieve the level of optimization required to fully realize the benefits of Prisma Cloud. However, this issue cannot be attributed to Prisma.

How are customer service and support?

We extensively contacted technical support because we used to experience numerous issues. However, our main purpose is to inquire about additional capabilities and make minor tweaks. The tech support provided by Palo Alto is excellent, without a doubt. This could be one of the reasons why Prisma Cloud is relatively expensive. 

We are an advanced partner, rather than an end user, which grants us easier access to technical support compared to clients. However, based on feedback from our clients, their technical support is exceptional.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward. In the beginning, we used professional services for a couple of clients but now we do it all in-house. 

What about the implementation team?

The implementation is completed in-house.

What was our ROI?

From a security standpoint, we have significantly enhanced our client's security posture by implementing Prisma Cloud. However, we still need to assess the return on investment. While we have achieved notable resource reduction, it remains uncertain whether it has yielded a better long-term ROI.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Prisma Cloud is remarkably expensive. Not everyone can afford it, without a doubt. Although we don't directly sell the product, we occasionally engage in reselling certain components, and it requires significant effort to make sales. There's no denying that it's expensive.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

I evaluated Snyk, which is a competitively priced product. However, I personally am not very familiar with how it works or the benefits gained by the different clients I've worked with, as I haven't had much experience with it. I conducted a couple of use cases and found it to be quite similar to Prisma Cloud in terms of features, although the interface has a different look and feel. I have been informed that Snyk is considerably cheaper compared to Prisma Cloud.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks a seven out of ten, primarily due to the need for improvement in identity-based micro-segmentation and cloud network security. I appreciate the potential it offers for deployment, but the new module has yet to reach a point where we can effectively reduce risks.

All the cloud environments existed before Prisma Cloud came in. I don't believe we can build many things using Prisma Cloud, except for implementing guardrails. For instance, we can secure these workloads, but it will take time for them to be fully developed. The scanners, such as the infrastructure as code scanners that Prisma Cloud can certainly check, are capable of performing static and code analysis, among other tasks. However, I don't think Prisma Cloud is designed specifically for that purpose.

Prisma offers risk clarity from a core security perspective, but it does not cover the entire pipeline. To cover the entire pipeline, we would need to utilize a SaaS or DaaS tool. Prisma Cloud cannot serve as a substitute for those tools.

I used to primarily work with cloud-native services. So, I would leverage cognitive services across all three clouds. That was my main focus initially. However, now I have started using other tools such as Snyk and various reports. Additionally, I have also recently started using CSPM. I'm not entirely familiar with all of them yet, but I have been working on them since the beginning.

No maintenance is required from our end.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor. The reviewer's company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
PeerSpot user
Aditya Thakur - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud Security Engineer at eSec Forte® Technologies
Real User
Top 10
Helps reduce run-time alerts, and investigation time, and provides deep visibility
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable features of Prisma Cloud are its cloud security posture management and cloud workload protection capabilities."
  • "We are encountering issues with the new permissions required for AWS integration with Prisma."

What is our primary use case?

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks is a comprehensive cloud security platform that encompasses vulnerability management, container management, Kubernetes management, and serverless management. It utilizes modules, such as Cloud Workload Protection, to provide comprehensive cloud security. Before deploying any applications, Prisma Cloud performs cloud scans to identify and address vulnerabilities, minimizing potential threats. The solution provides visibility into our cloud environment, enabling us to effectively manage and monitor our infrastructure. This capability is particularly valuable in the financial industry, where hybrid multi-cloud environments are prevalent.

We use all the modules Prisma Cloud offers.

How has it helped my organization?

Prisma Cloud offers security scanning for multi-cloud and hybrid cloud environments. This is crucial because managing multiple cloud accounts, such as AWS, GCP, and Azure, typically necessitates accessing each account individually to view the inventories of assets and services. Prisma Cloud eliminates this inconvenience by consolidating all of this information into a single unified interface, providing a comprehensive overview.

The comprehensiveness enhances threat protection by providing integrated and out-of-the-box policies, along with all the necessary components, to effectively secure cloud environments and achieve comprehensive visibility through Prisma's capabilities.

The security automation capabilities of Prisma Cloud are effective. We can automatically remediate some of the alerts using predefined policies. We utilize Defender to detect vulnerabilities in our containers, AKS, and GKE environments.

Prisma Cloud has benefited our organization in so many ways that we can't count them all on our fingers. The Cloud Security Posture Management module of Prisma provides a wide range of capabilities, including visibility, governance, compliance, auto-remediation, integration with hybrid cloud environments, vulnerability reporting, and blocking capabilities. It also offers compliance reports, integration with third-party tools for vulnerability and alert notifications, and Cloud Workload Protection capabilities for blocking, alerting, and specifying affected containers or servers. Additionally, it provides visibility into code security by monitoring the Infrastructure as a Code environment for unauthorized users.

It enables a proactive approach to cloud security, allowing us to prevent vulnerabilities, threats, and complications arising in cloud or hybrid cloud environments. We can easily investigate and obtain comprehensive reports.

We spent the first five months after implementing Prisma Cloud familiarizing ourselves with the solution and completing the training sessions provided by Palo Alto. During this time, we began to see the benefits that Prisma Cloud offered our organization.

Prisma Cloud works with the CIB. Therefore, when we build and deploy something, we can incorporate a Prisma scan, which assists us in scanning the images and gaining insights into the state of our environment. It provides us with comprehensive visibility and raises alerts or triggers notifications to inform us of any missing elements or potential issues. This is how Prisma can contribute to the build and deploy phases.

It provides deep visibility and control regardless of how complex our cloud environment becomes.

Prisma Cloud enables us to integrate security into our CI/CD pipeline and it provides us with a single tool to protect all of our cloud resources.

Prisma Cloud provides run-time risk clarity throughout the entire pipeline, revealing issues as they arise. This enables us to effectively block vulnerabilities and rectify identified problems.

We have reduced run-time alerts. The run-time protection has helped many of our clients protect their environments.

Prisma Cloud has significantly reduced our investigation time. The clear visibility it provides into our environment and the process flow has streamlined our investigations. Additionally, using Prisma to investigate issues rather than directly accessing our cloud accounts saves valuable time.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable features of Prisma Cloud are its cloud security posture management and cloud workload protection capabilities. Integrating Prisma Cloud with our cloud service providers provides a comprehensive view of our multiple cloud environments through a single dashboard. This enhanced visibility improves vulnerability management and compliance. With CWP, we can gain complete visibility into all workloads within our environment.

What needs improvement?

We are encountering issues with the new permissions required for AWS integration with Prisma. Specifically, we need a mechanism to automatically identify and integrate the missing configuration permissions that are introduced on a biweekly or monthly basis. We have requested the Palo Alto team to develop this automation, and we are eagerly awaiting its implementation. We appreciate the efforts of the engineering team for their contributions.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks for two years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Prisma Cloud is a stable platform. The only downtime we experience is scheduled, and Palo Alto notifies us in advance of the scheduled outage and its duration.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I would rate the scalability of Prisma Cloud a nine out of ten. I have received positive feedback from our clients indicating that Prisma Cloud is an excellent fit for their environment.

How are customer service and support?

We have repeatedly contacted technical support to address issues encountered by both ourselves and our clients. The support is helpful.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We previously used AWS GuardDuty for vulnerability management and compliance visibility, but it was not user-friendly due to the requirement to log into separate accounts to access reports.

How was the initial setup?

When I first started using Prisma, I found it to be very easy to learn. Several of our engineers were already familiar with Prisma Cloud and were able to help me understand how it worked, including the UI, navigation, and integration with other tools. They also showed me how to make API calls and integrate Prisma with third-party tools. Additionally, the Prisma team was incredibly helpful whenever I contacted them for assistance. They were always willing to answer my questions and help me troubleshoot any issues I was having.

What about the implementation team?

I completed the implementation myself after completing the training sessions with the Palo Alto team and attending a lab session for the Prisma Cloud deployment.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I don't have direct access to financial information, so I'm not fully aware of the overall costs. However, I do work with clients and solution teams to provide relevant solutions. I also collaborate with the research team to explain Prisma's capabilities and its comprehensive range of features. When I see the credits and other similar programs may make Prisma's licensing costs appear lower than those of competing tools, it's important to consider the overall cost when evaluating cloud security solutions. For example, when implementing cloud security measures for CSPs or CWPs, other tools may be required, potentially leading to higher overall costs than Prisma Cloud's comprehensive solution.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks nine out of ten.

Prisma Cloud necessitates maintenance for both weekly and monthly updates.

My advice to new users and researchers is to delve into Prisma Cloud's capabilities and potential. Understanding the full scope of what it can do is crucial for new users. It's not just about visibility or the GUI; it's about the underlying work that engineers do, such as runtime protection, virus detection, and code security. New users should have a clear understanding of these capabilities. They should participate in sessions, practices, and labs to gain hands-on experience.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor. The reviewer's company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
PeerSpot user
reviewer2293101 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr Security Engineer at a financial services firm with 201-500 employees
Real User
Great support, helps with compliance, and offers good reporting
Pros and Cons
  • "The support is excellent."
  • "The UI is good, however, they could improve the experience."

What is our primary use case?

We used a couple of modules, mostly WAFs. We use it for detection. 

We use it for our modern infrastructure, mostly run on the cloud. We use it to measure the security of cloud-native infrastructure and to calculate the risk of the applications we use and APIs we interact with. We also use it to meet compliance requirements. We have plenty of use cases for this product.

How has it helped my organization?

We really wanted to capture all of the information. To make something in-house would be too much engineering work for us. We don't have to bui;d something from scratch; this allows us to use something that is highly accurate.

We're a fintech company and we deal with a bank. Doing certain tasks manually, like logging every node, server, and container, can take six to nine months. However, if you can automate the process, you achieve the same results in a short time span to help ensure product security.

What is most valuable?

We were using common CBE for general identities.

I personally used the web application API security, WAF for in-line controls. It helps with implementing an additional layer of security to block the attacks and get alerts on vulnerabilities. I am just focusing on that side.

The support is excellent. They'll call us personally and keep us updated. It's some of the best support I've dealt with.

It's great for protecting the full cloud-native stack. Being a security engineer, I have the visibility of the solution on the infrastructure. The tool is doing a good job of automating this process and making it less time-consuming for me. I don't need to handle as many manual tasks.

There are various cloud configurations that can help you gain insights. If a threat is on the portal, it will give you insight into the cloud infrastructure to help you improve the configuration to make it more secure. In terms of threat detection, you can see different kinds of payloads coming to the API. It helps you consider fixes, like adding more validation.

It is very easy for us to generate reports and download the findings while working with the team to resolve issues.

It's good for build, deploy, and run, however, we still need to figure out how to better integrate it. We're still in the early stages of exploring this for CI/CD. 

The solution does provide the visibility and control we need regardless of how complex or distributed your cloud environment becomes. When we were using our core infrastructure previously, we didn't have the visibility, for example, on which APIs we had or were using. Now, there's a better understanding. It's helped us become more confident in our security and compliance posture. If someone comes tomorrow to audit, we can do a fast report and we can pass that over to show to compliance. It would show the risk factors and what we are monitoring. It's the first thing we would go to during an audit, to provide transparency. 

The solution provides a single tool to protect all of our cloud resources and applications without having to manage and reconcile disparate security and compliance details. It's mandatory to have a tool like this to run a fintech in India as we need to have an audit trail in order to be able to submit reports. Operationally, it's helping us stay compliant. 

We are able to enable alerts. We are using it more manually. We can see alerts on Slack. We can configure alerts as we like.

What needs improvement?

The UI is good, however, they could improve the experience. The animations on the dashboard could be better. They may already be working on an update to improve this.

We'd like to understand better how to automate between the pipeline and CI/CD. There's a bridge needed between DevOps and security. We need to understand the alerts. There seems to be a gap in DevOps that we need to reconcile. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using the solution for more than six months. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

While running the solution, we have no issues at all. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We have Prisma installed on Google Cloud, across multiple accounts and environments. We also have data recovery in another region. I'm not sure if that is covered by Prisma. 

It's scalable. It's not difficult. In fact, it's easy. You just need to add agents to the nodes you want. 

How are customer service and support?

Technical support is great. There are two teams. One is always available. Another is creating tickets and looking into issues. Both are quite good. They are eager to support the customer. 

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We were using another product previously. It was called Lacework. The virtual business aspect was a reason we switched. We also wanted to have more functionality and more insight and control into APIs. The visibility was also better with Prisma. 

How was the initial setup?

The deployment was handled by the DevOps team, not the security team, which is the team I am a part of. There was a requirement to install it on every node of the infrastructure. However, my understanding is it did not take too much time. My understanding is that it was easy to install and it was done within 30 minutes to an hour. It was deployed in a very short amount of time. One person was able to deploy it; we didn't need a team. 

There may be some maintenance required. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I'm not sure of the licensing terms or the exact pricing. 

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We did evaluate multiple tools. We knew what we needed the tools to do and we were comparing them all together. We realized that Prisma did a better job and decided to go with them. 

What other advice do I have?

I am a customer and end-user. 

I'm not sure if the product is useful in a multi-cloud environment. I hope it is. We just have the one cloud environment we use it in. That said, we are using it in multiple staging environments. 

We have not enabled the Code Security module. We still need to integrate in that sense with Prisma. We did do the integration with cloud infrastructure. 

For any product you choose, it's good to consider security. I'd recommend Prisma as it offers good security. 

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten. There isn't really anything missing in the product. However, there's always scope for improvement. 

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
reviewer1108272 - PeerSpot reviewer
Consultant at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Consultant
Provides the visibility and control we need, regardless of how complex or distributed our cloud environment becomes
Pros and Cons
  • "The initial setup is seamless."
  • "There needs to be a mechanism that allows me to manually configure compliance more easily."

What is our primary use case?

We use Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks for our cloud security posture management.

How has it helped my organization?

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks has multiple aspects that help protect the full cloud-native stack. We are not concerned with just one cloud at the enterprise level; we are focused on the multiple cloud environments we have. The solution provides us with a comprehensive dashboard and a comprehensive view of our cloud security posture. Furthermore, the solution not only covers the security posture but also informs us of our compliance with leading industry standards.

The solution does have security automation capabilities, but we do not use much of it in this case. We use automation for the alerts; if there are any misconfigurations, the alerts are automated. However, we do not mitigate any specific items using automation, as that is something we have not configured. We prefer to first look at the problem manually, and then take action against it.

There is no single comprehensive cloud security solution. We will need to use multiple tools, such as those offered by Palo Alto Networks and Check Point. Every security firm has a range of products, so if we consider all of them, we can have anti-virus, anti-malware, vulnerability assessment solutions, EDP software, and cloud security posture management. We need to evaluate each tool, and Prisma and Check Point both offer good solutions, including next-generation firewalls.

The solution provides the visibility and control we need, regardless of how complex or distributed our cloud environment becomes.

The solution can enable us to incorporate security into our CI/CD pipeline and add checkpoints to existing DevOps processes. From an automation standpoint, we enabled certain monitoring features. However, the remediation steps are still manual. This can be integrated into our DevOps pipeline, though some of the features are not being used as we prefer to keep it manual.

The solution provides us with a single tool to protect all of our cloud resources and applications, without having to manage and reconcile disparate security and compliance reports.

The solution reduced runtime alerts. We don't need to receive all the runtime alerts every time, as they will overwhelm us with messages. People often neglect this. Depending on the situation, generally, only very important alerts should be sent. I prefer that the solution be configured for when there is a major business impact. For minor alerts and notifications, we can still check the dashboard. Generally, we monitor the dashboards at certain times. We don't need to be alerted for everything, as this will defeat the purpose of this mechanism.

The solution significantly improved the time taken to investigate alerts by 40 percent with the alert monitoring and all its mechanisms, we receive our critical alerts quickly via email. We can even configure the remediation, although we have not done so yet. 

What is most valuable?

I appreciate the multi-cloud support that this solution provides; I can use it with AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud. I find the ability to configure alerts and monitor misconfigurations in the cloud to be particularly useful, and we take advantage of this feature as well.

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks is an impressive solution. The solution continuously assesses our security posture, making it the ideal preventive measure. If any misconfigurations occur, I am immediately notified of any unnecessary ports that are open in my cloud. This alerting system allows me to take the necessary steps to secure it before any attack can occur, making it the best preventive measure for our cloud.

What needs improvement?

I now extensively use cloud security posture management. There needs to be a mechanism that allows me to manually configure compliance more easily. Currently, it requires programming knowledge, so if someone without hardware programming knowledge could customize certain features to their requirements, it would be very helpful.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the solution for five months.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is stable because it is a SaaS offering.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Nowadays, all cloud solutions are scalable; scalability should be a given feature and does not need to be asked for.

A maximum of ten people have administrative-level access, which will be used by 50 to 60 Security Operations Center personnel. This personnel must log in with various role-based access rights. In total, we have around 70 people using the solution.

How are customer service and support?

In my previous project, we had a dedicated team associated with the account, so we did not have to pay for support. This was beneficial because, most of the time, we would go to our account team instead of the technical support, and our issues would be resolved quickly.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is seamless. We only need to integrate our API key and connect it.

The deployment took one hour.

What was our ROI?

I can see one return on investment due to continuous monitoring. Before, we had a few staff members who monitored our environment, but now the alerting and other processes happen automatically, so there is a good ROI in terms of resources. Additionally, the security posture of the environment is increased and fewer incidents occur, which improves our response time and resource efficiency. There are also indirect ROIs.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The pricing is competitive; for the most part, the security firms have similar prices. Therefore, I believe it is competitive and a good investment. The solution is good quality, so I would not hesitate to invest in Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks.

What other advice do I have?

I give the solution a nine out of ten.

I absolutely recommend Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks at an enterprise level because the solution is an enterprise-grade product.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Hybrid Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: May 2025
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.