Palo Alto Networks Unveils Integrated SASE Platform
Palo Alto Networks today unveiled a secure access service edge (SASE) platform that brings together its existing access control and software-defined wide area network (SD-WAN) in a single offering.
Anand Oswal, senior vice president of products for firewall-as-a-platform at Palo Alto Networks, said Prisma SASE brings together Prisma Access and Prisma SD-WAN via a cloud-based service that enables IT organizations to enforce zero-trust polices regardless of where employees are working.
Previously, Palo Alto Networks positioned Prisma Access as its SASE platform while offering a separate SD-WAN. Now, the company is moving to integrate those offerings in a way that it claims is the first to tightly integrate all five requirements for a SASE platform as defined by the research firm Gartner, said Oswal.
The Gartner definition of SASE described a platform that combines a secure web access gateway (SWG), cloud access security broker (CASB), firewall as-a-service and zero-trust network access with an SD-WAN. The overall goal is to combine network and security functions in a single platform that enables remote users to access applications running either in the cloud or in on-premises IT environment without having to backhaul all the network traffic from cloud services through a local data center. That approach then makes it possible for end users to access those services from anywhere without relying on virtual private network (VPN) software that is usually cumbersome to employ and challenging for IT teams to manage.
In addition to combining Prisma Access and Prisma SD-WAN, the integrated platform launched by Palo Alto Networks also includes support for wireless 5G networks. These networks are starting to be used in some instances as a replacement for Wi-Fi networks. Historically, organizations have employed wireless 4G networks as a backup to Wi-Fi networks should there ever be a connectivity issue. However, with the rise of 5G, some organizations have moved away from using Wi-Fi networks in remote offices, noted Oswal.
Palo Alto Networks has also integrated an existing autonomous digital experience management (ADEM) troubleshooting tool in addition to making available integrations for ServiceNow, Microsoft Teams and Zoom via its CloudBlades application programming interfaces (APIs).
According to Palo Alto Networks’ recent State of Hybrid Workforce Security 2021 survey, 61% of organizations have struggled to provide the necessary remote security to support employees working from home. It’s not clear to what degree organizations are ready to replace the hodgepodge of networking and security tools and services they put in place at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic to support employees working from home. With many workers expected to continue to work from home well into 2022, it’s clear the days when most employees worked behind a corporate firewall are over.
The challenge now is determining how best to securely support a workforce that, even after the pandemic eventually subsides, may not be coming into the office as frequently, if at all. Once employees determine they can work from home just as effectively as they did in the office, many may simply decide there’s not much point to making an hours-long commute when they could be more productive at home.
The trouble is, most of the existing approaches to remote networking were designed to support a relatively small number of remote workers. Organizations now require a more comprehensive approach capable of supporting hundreds, even thousands, of remote employees that is both easier to manage and less costly to deploy.
