Palo Alto Networks WildFire Reviews

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.

We have the Palo Alto Firewall sitting on the edge and everything that comes through it is analyzed. Even if anything comes through via email, it is forwarded to the WildFire service, which then opens up email attachments to see if they do any damage to the system. If it reports back that the attachment should not be forwarded then it keeps it out.

WildFire has discovered a lot of stuff that our other anti-spam tool did not, so it has been quite good.

Using WildFire has reduced the number of viruses and the amount of malware that comes into our system, which means that I don't have to rely on the end-users to identify it. This results in less chance that our systems will get infected. I would estimate that there has been a 15% - 20% reduction in that kind of stuff getting through.

The most valuable feature is where it automatically opens up the emails and checks to see if any damage occurs to the system. That's something that would be difficult for us to do here manually, simply because we get so many emails coming in. I think about 80% of the emails we get are spam and for us to be able to manually go through that, one by one, looking to see whether they are good or not, would take perhaps 50 people full-time.

Palo Alto is very tech-heavy, and the average user can't just go and deploy one. You really need to know what you're doing. I've been doing IT for more than 25 years and I sometimes have to double-check things or ask for help. The reason is that there is so much included in the solution. It would be nice if there was an easier way to install and deploy it, such as through the inclusion of wizards. Having a more complex product generally means that you need more technical expertise, although if very experienced people are still having trouble then it is probably worth revisiting and trying to improve.

It would be nice to have some sort of remote management tool. As far as I'm aware, they don't have a tool that runs on a mobile device, so you need to be in front of a workstation in order to get it up and running. If I had a remote tool that allowed me to access it then it would be very helpful. Even if I have to VPN into the network, that's fine, because being able to remotely do stuff on my phone would be useful. Everything is going that way.

We have been using Palo Alto WildFire for about seven years.

This solution is quite stable and we've had very few problems.

We did have one false positive that nobody was able to figure out, including Palo Alto and our consultants. Ultimately, I was able to find the problem, write some code and embed it, and that has kept the problem from reoccurring. Otherwise, it has been rock solid.

It is quite extensively used in our organization. Literally, it is used non-stop.

This solution is quite scalable. The specific solution that we have was sized for our environment but I know that you can get other models that will scale up or down, depending on what you need. I think that it should work fine, regardless of what type of organization you're in.

We have between 60 and 70 users. Everybody from the CEO to delivery drivers, office workers, and mobile employees use this solution.

Technical support from Palo Alto is very strong. Whenever I've had problems, they've been able to help me out, every single time. I've gone to them with some pretty complex stuff and they will sit with you until it's done. They have technical support that follows the sun, so if I've got somebody who is in the same timezone and their shift ends, they will transfer me to another person who is just starting their day and can spend another eight hours with me, if necessary. 

The biggest lesson that I learned from using this solution is not to hesitate to call support. You're going to bang your head against the wall trying to figure things out, and meanwhile, these guys are just sitting there waiting to help you. They will figure things out a lot faster than you will. 

The company did have a previous solution. I don't know what it was, but the switch to this product was based on the recommendation from the telco.

The initial setup is fairly complex.

One of the challenges is that you often need to have a third-party implement the solution, and whoever handles the task needs to understand your network and your use case extremely well. They have to know it so well that really, they need to be an employee and work with the environment in order to roll it out properly. It's difficult to do, so that means you need to have a highly technically skilled individual who can go in and implement stuff that works with the company. Unfortunately, most smaller companies just don't have that kind of person.

From the point that we first started talking about it, followed by the installation, setting it up, and testing, it probably took a couple of months. We first implemented a test network, which was segmented off and used in parallel. We had some people who were willing to test the new system and helped us to gain confidence in the implementation. Once it was complete, we brought everybody over to the new network and remove the old one.

We had a consultant come in and he did an okay-job. However, I had to go back in later on and rework a bunch of stuff, simply because he didn't understand the environment.

The company we used was Telus, which is a telco in Canada. When the primary consultant would run into problems then he would call somebody else, who in turn called somebody else. In total, we had several people from Telus who were working on the implementation.

For the deployment staff, you will be needing two or three people. They have to have an understanding of the business, networking, networking protocols, and security.

With respect to the maintenance, it is pretty hands-off. One or two people can handle it, as long as they've got a strong understanding of how the Palo Alto system works. The only time you really need to touch it is if you need to make a modification to the web filtering rules or if you need to modify the configuration to allow for different services or different devices on the network.

This solution saves us a pile of money because we don't have to manually go through all of our emails.

Smaller organizations may find it a bit costly. It is not a cheap solution, simply because of everything that it can do, so there might be a cost barrier for smaller organizations.

We pay between $3,000 and $4,000 CAD ($2,200 - $3,000 USD) per year to maintain this solution. There are different charges the depend on the different options, such as WildFire or different virus signatures. 

This is a very good solution and from a technical perspective and it does a fantastic job. At the same time, we are actually planning on getting rid of it, as it is probably overkill for what we need. I think that when they were looking at this device, they didn't really know where to turn. I was not working here at the time, so they took the recommendation from their telco.

My intention is to replace it with four or five individual firewalls, which gives us a little bit of redundancy and does some other things for us. Palo Alto has a lot of advanced stuff that it brings with it, and we don't have a need for it.

Specifically for WildFire, we're shifting away from on-premises email and going to a cloud-based email system. In that type of managed solution, the provider handles messaging security.

My advice for anybody who is researching this solution is to consider the requirements and the cost. I guarantee that this product will do what you need, but you have to make sure that what you need is what it provides. It is possible that there is more in there than what you'll actually use, so you need to think about whether it is worth the cost. The reason that we're changing is cost-related. For what they are charging us every year, I will completely replace all of our hardware, get exactly what we need, and only pay for it once. We will be saving $3,000 - $5,000 CAD ($2,200 - $3,800 USD) every year after this, just because we don't have those licensing costs associated with it.

The bottom line is that this solution has the ability to do an awful lot of stuff, and if it were easier to configure then it would be even better.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

We primarily use the solution for threat protection. 

I found the solution easy to deploy.

It has a nice IP set.

The VPN technologies are very good. 

It's largely very feature-rich.

The solution is scalable. 

Technical support is generally helpful.

It is stable and reliable. 

I don't have any real problems with the solution. 

High availability features are lacking. It's a bit too standard as a solution. It needs high availability. 

We'd like the solution to be a bit cheaper. It's quite pricey. 

I've been working with the solution for three or four years. 

The solution is pretty stable. I'd rate it eight or nine out of ten in terms of reliability. It has limitations for high-availability features. It's more traditional. 

It's a good solution if you need to scale. 

We have three or four customers using the solution right now. 

Technical support is fine. We haven't had issues with them when we need help. 

The solution is straightforward to set up. Since it is so easy, it takes one or two months for a migration. An initial setup might take one or two weeks. 

We need Panorama. We give the IP to the team and Panorama as well. Then we have to ensure the firewall has internet access. 

There are a lot of licensing options. It can be a bit complicated for users. They could work to simplify the options. The product is also a very expensive firewall. 

I'm an integrator. We do use a variety of versions of the solution. We have a few clients using the product. 

I'd recommend the solution to others. It improves protection and is a good firewall. 

I would rate the solution eight out of ten. I'm happy with its capabilities.

We use the solution for site-to-site VPNs and it replaces the proxy.

The most valuable features of the solution are user-friendliness, price, good security, and cloud-related options.

The solution can improve its traffic management.

I have been using the solution for three months.

I give the stability a ten out of ten.

I give the scalability a seven out of ten. We have seven thousand people using the solution.

We previously used Cisco Networks but we switched to Palo Alto Networks WildFire because it has more options that meet our needs.

The initial setup is straightforward.

The implementation was completed in-house.

The price is fair and comparable to other solutions.

I give the solution an eight out of ten.

A limited number of people are required for maintenance. One person is enough for the day-to-day but we have overlapped for coverage. 

I like the analysis they apply to the unknown files, and I think they have good technology to use as a sandboxing tool. I didn't find something similar to WildFire in the marketplace.

The price could be better.

I have been using Palo Alto Networks WildFire for about four years.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is a stable solution.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give stability a ten.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is a scalable solution.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give scalability a ten.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give technical support a seven.

Neutral

The initial setup was straightforward. It takes ten minutes or less because it's just to activate a button. And after that, the client has to apply the security profile to security rules. One cybersecurity engineer can deploy and maintain this solution, but it depends on the company's size.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give the initial setup a ten.

Our clients say they have an ROI because they don't have to analyze the file with a lot of different tools. They consider that all the information is centralized, and they like that.

The price could be better.

I used the solution, and I think that it's wonderful. They have different layers of analysis, but I wouldn't say I like the price. 

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Palo Alto Networks WildFire a nine.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is an ATP solution. It provides advanced threat protection, so it can protect customers against zero-day attacks.

The only problem with this solution is the cost. It's expensive.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire demonstrates good performance. It's stable.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire has good scalability.

We came across some issues with the Palo Alto support team, but overall their support is okay.

Like any other firewall, this product is okay, in terms of setup. The initial setup was very quick, and can be done within a few minutes.

This product and its license is expensive.

Most of the customers get a yearly subscription.

I didn't see any costs in addition to the standard license and fees for Palo Alto Networks WildFire.

We also provide Palo Alto Networks WildFire to our customers, and we've been dealing with it since it came into the product line.

We deployed this solution both on cloud and on-premises. It's a mixture of both types of deployment.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is a good solution. It has been able to mitigate a lot of threats and attacks.

We have a lot of customers using Palo Alto Networks WildFire.

We have network engineers who handle the deployment and maintenance of this solution, and they are the same people who handle the deployment and maintenance of Fortinet FortiGate.

We recommend this product to people who want to start using it, but if the customer only has limited budget, then we cannot recommend it.

I'm giving Palo Alto Networks WildFire a score of eight out of ten.

We use WildFire for malware protection in our customers' companies.

WildFire's application encryption is useful.

The system performance degrades after the solution has been deployed for some time. The data that it gives us becomes a little bit slow. When you try to get some data for troubleshooting, it seems like it's working hard to extract that data. 

I've been selling WildFire for more than two years.

WildFire is stable.

Wildfire is scalable.

Palo Alto support is very slow in this region.

WildFire is easy to deploy. I have been working on these solutions for quite some time, so I don't foresee any issues.

WildFire is a little bit pricey. Sometimes it's difficult to sell it to customers at the current price.

We sometimes use Fortinet FortiGate for clients. It depends upon the requirements, which vary from customer to customer. 

I rate WildFire six out of 10. To people considering WildFire, I recommend that they understand their own needs. They should do the proper due diligence. Right now, everybody's cutting costs because of COVID-19. They're trying to automate most things through the PA, so the cost-cutting is going to be a major factor in the future.

We are using Palo Alto Networks WildFire as a firewall to block malicious traffic. We use the IOCs, such as hash signatures matches, and IP addresses to block potential threats. Additionally, we use Palo Alto for VPN connectivity, but this is another product.

The solution has plenty of features.

I have been using Palo Alto Networks WildFire for approximately three years.

The solution is stable.

Palo Alto Networks WildFire is scalable.

We have 12 offices that are using Palo Alto Network solutions.

I have previously used Juniper solutions, such as the vSRX model.

The solution is easy to install.

We had one person from the vendor's support team help us do the implementation of the solution. They were very helpful.

The price of the Palo Alto Networks WildFire license is expensive. When it came time to renew the solution the price doubled.

We are evaluating other solutions, such as FortiGate because the price of Palo Alto Networks WildFire is high.

If your organization can afford this solution then I would recommend it. However, there are other solutions on the market that have similar features at a lower cost, such as FortiGate and Juniper.

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