Palo Alto Networks Launches PAN-OS 7.0, New Management Appliance

Enterprise security vendor Palo Alto Networks (PANW) unveiled more than 70 additions to its security platform to help enterprise customers prevent cyberattacks as part of its PAN-OS 7.0 release. Both the new operating system and the new Panorama M-500 management appliance are designed to provide end-to-end protection of data centers from internal and external threats.

The enhancements in OS 7.0 are expected to help users boost their automated threat analysis capabilities to help manage the ever-increasing number of tasks associated with protecting critical assets from attack, according to the press release. Since many of these tasks require manual processes, threats can sometimes slip by undetected and cause damage to critical company assets, noted Scott Gainey, vice president of Product Marketing at Palo Alto Networks.

“Most important among many new capabilities featured in the new PAN-OS 7.0 is the ability to quickly identify and take preventative action against threats of all kinds in various stages of the attack life cycle and across any network segment,” said Gainey in a statement.

Among the new features included in PAN-OS 7.0, users have the ability to automate essential processes to identify and protect corporate assets against cyberattacks. The OS accomplishes this through a new automated correlation engine that identifies and quarantines compromised hosts by identifying suspicious activity patterns, according to the announcement. 

The operating system utilizes WildFire threat intelligence enhancements automate analysis of files against multiple versions of applications, so the solution can identify malware that specifically targets older versions of an application.

Palo Alto also introduced a new network-processing card for its PA-7050 solution to provide prevention at scale for data center environments with more than 1G port density and new 40G ports.

The company’s Panorama network management solution now features advanced policy management capabilities the company said will make it easier to create security policies and device configurations that can be applied to next-generation firewall instances to reduce the chance of human error and gaps in the policy or configuration, according to the press release.

Additionally, Palo Alto previewed the upcoming Panorama M-500 management appliance to help manage user firewalls. The solution includes a 4x storage increase from the previous release and includes additional RAM and dual power supplies, according to the company.

Palo Alto customers with a current support contract can purchase PAN-OS 7.0 today, while the M-500 platform as well as the Network Processing Card are expected to launch at the end of this month.