Palo Alto Networks Expands Range of Next-Generation Firewall Devices with New Hardware and Virtual Appliances

SANTA CLARA, Calif., Feb. 7, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Palo Alto Networks® (NYSE: PANW), the next-generation security company, today announced availability of new purpose-built hardware and virtual next-generation firewall appliances that safely enable applications and redefine security performance for both threat prevention and SSL decryption, enabling customers to safely embrace the cloud and prevent successful cyberattacks across network, endpoint and cloud environments.

The new models complement enhancements to the Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Security Platform PAN-OS® operating system version 8.0, also introduced today, which includes more than 70 new features that deliver threat and credential theft prevention, secure cloud enablement, and more.

As organizations look to modernize their physical data centers, embrace hybrid cloud environments, and apply advanced security measures across their infrastructure, they require greater performance to handle the tremendous amount of traffic generated by the growing number of users, applications and devices. The introduction of new SaaS applications running at higher throughputs further increases demand for bandwidth performance to and from the network.

Complicating matters, as more and more traffic is encrypted by SSL, enterprises are left blind to the applications and content their users are accessing, and advanced cyber adversaries are increasingly leveraging SSL encryption to obscure malicious activity, leaving organizations unaware of the hidden dangers lurking on their networks. Legacy security products are simply unable to perform at rates high enough to decrypt this traffic and restore the visibility required to prevent cyber breaches.

To address these needs and more, six new hardware firewall appliances join the existing hardware family of 16 appliances to safely enable applications and offer threat prevention in large data centers, small branches and remote locations, all managed centrally from Panorama™ network security management. The new and powerful hardware appliances enable advanced security protections applied at speed and scale by delivering predictable performance with deep visibility into and control over all traffic, including encrypted traffic.

The VM-Series virtualized next-generation firewall family also has been optimized and expanded with three new models to support customer organizations expanding cloud and virtualization initiatives – from virtualized branch offices to data center and service provider deployments – that require high throughput and capacity. With the new additions, the VM-Series now represents the industry's broadest line of virtualized firewall appliances, delivering groundbreaking cloud security performance of up to 16 Gbps with App-ID™ technology visibility and over 10 Gbps with full threat prevention enabled.

Highlights of the new hardware and virtual firewalls include:

• New PA-5200 Series: This new series includes three devices: the PA-5260, PA-5250 and PA-5220. This new advanced architecture delivers 72 Gbps App-ID and 30 Gbps Threat Prevention performance, up to 32M sessions, 3.2M SSL-decrypt session capacity and 6.5 Gbps SSL-decrypt throughput on the PA-5260 model. Higher 10G port density and 40G and 100G interface supports diverse deployments. These models deliver security for high throughput environments within a compact form factor, making them ideal for data center consolidation, increased gateway demands, and inspecting encrypted traffic.
• New PA-800 Series: The new PA-800 series includes two devices: the PA-850 and PA-820. This new architecture delivers 1.9 Gbps App-ID and 780 Mbps Threat Prevention performance on the PA-850. A high-performance management plane leverages multiple CPU cores and 8GB memory. The PA-850 features redundant power for additional hardware resiliency. These models are ideal for medium-sized networks, and branch and remote office environments.
• New PA-220 delivers full PAN-OS capabilities in a small desktop footprint with increased port density. The PA-220 features built-in resiliency via dual power adapters and complete high availability support for active/active and active/passive clusters. Passive and silent cooling eliminates noise and increases reliability. The small footprint makes these models ideal for small branch offices and remote locations.
• Three new VM-Series virtual firewall models: These new models deliver industry-leading cloud security performance options ranging from 200 Mbps up to an industry-leading 16 Gbps to deliver predictable performance in cloud deployments and address a variety of use cases, from virtualized branch office to data center and service provider deployments.
  • New VM-50 is optimized to consume minimal resources yet delivers 200 Mbps of App-ID performance for customer scenarios that range from virtual branch office/customer premise equipment (CPE) to high-density, multi-tenancy environments.
  • Faster VM-100, VM-200, VM-300 and VM-1000-HV have been optimized to deliver 2-4 times their previous performance with 2 Gbps and 4 Gbps of App-ID performance for hybrid cloud, segmentation and internet gateway use cases.
  • New VM-500 and VM-700 deliver an industry-leading 8 Gbps to 16 Gbps of App-ID performance, respectively, and can be deployed as NFV security components in fully virtualized data center and service provider environments.

Complementing these firewall introductions is the release of Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Security Platform PAN-OS® operating system version 8.0, which includes threat and credential theft prevention, cloud security and management advancements. See these related press releases:

• Palo Alto Networks Extends Safe Application Enablement and Breach Prevention From the Network to the Cloud with Enhancements to Its Next-Generation Security Platform
• Palo Alto Networks Raises Bar with New Threat Prevention Capabilities for Its Next-Generation Security Platform
• Palo Alto Networks Delivers Industry-First Capabilities to Prevent Credential Theft and Abuse

Quotes

• "Cloud migration is a dynamic, bi-directional, and continuous process – sending workloads back and forth between the multiple clouds and data centers. The advancements announced today by Palo Alto Networks, including their new VM-series firewalls, provide customers a critical solution that is flexible enough to facilitate efficient movement between private networks and public/private clouds as new use cases are implemented."

     -          Jeff Wilson, senior research director, Cybersecurity Technology, IHS Markit

• "Palo Alto Networks understands the growing performance and capacity needs as customer organizations look to expand cloud use cases and implement advanced security capabilities throughout their data centers and distributed organizations. We are pleased to expand the performance range and use case possibilities with our newest hardware and virtual firewall models."

     -          Lee Klarich, executive vice president, Product Management, Palo Alto Networks

Learn More

• What's New in PAN-OS 8.0
• Full Range of Hardware Offerings
• Management at Scale
• Register to Attend Palo Alto Networks Colossal Security Event
• Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Security Platform
• Blog: Announcing PAN-OS 8.0 - Our Biggest Launch Yet

About Palo Alto Networks
Palo Alto Networks is the next-generation security company, leading a new era in cybersecurity by safely enabling applications and preventing cyber breaches for tens of thousands of organizations worldwide. Built with an innovative approach and highly differentiated cyberthreat prevention capabilities, our game-changing security platform delivers security far superior to legacy or point products, safely enables daily business operations, and protects an organization's most valuable assets.  Find out more at www.paloaltonetworks.com.

Palo Alto Networks and the Palo Alto Networks logo are trademarks of Palo Alto Networks, Inc. in the United States and in jurisdictions throughout the world. All other trademarks, trade names or service marks used or mentioned herein belong to their respective owners.

SOURCE Palo Alto Networks, Inc.