Cloud NGFW for AWS is a Next-Generation Firewall as a Service. Its key components work together to provide comprehensive network security.
A. Cloud NGFW Resource: This represents the actual deployed firewall instance within your AWS environment. It's the core processing engine that inspects and secures network traffic. The Cloud NGFW resource is deployed in a VPC and associated with subnets, enabling traffic inspection between VPCs, subnets, and to/from the internet.
B. Local or Global Rulestacks: These define the security policies that govern traffic inspection. Rulestacks contain rules that match traffic based on various criteria (e.g., source/destination IP, port, application) and specify the action to take (e.g., allow, deny, inspect). Local Rulestacks are specific to a single Cloud NGFW resource, while Global Rulestacks can be shared across multiple Cloud NGFW resources for consistent policy enforcement.
C. Cloud NGFW Inspector: The Cloud NGFW Inspector is the core component performing the deep packet inspection and applying security policies. It resides within the Cloud NGFW Resource and analyzes network traffic based on the configured rulestacks. It provides advanced threat prevention capabilities, including intrusion prevention (IPS), malware detection, and URL filtering.
D. Amazon S3 bucket: While S3 buckets can be used for logging and storing configuration backups in some firewall deployments, they are not a core component of the Cloud NGFW architecture itself. Cloud NGFW uses its own logging and management infrastructure.
E. Cloud NGFW Tenant: The term "Tenant" is usually associated with multi-tenant architectures where resources are shared among multiple customers. While Palo Alto Networks provides a managed service for Cloud NGFW, the deployment within your AWS account is dedicated and not considered a tenant in the traditional multi-tenant sense. The management of the firewall is done through Panorama or Cloud Management.
References:
While direct, concise documentation specifically listing these three components in this exact format is difficult to pinpoint in a single document, the Palo Alto Networks documentation consistently describes these elements as integral. The concepts are spread across multiple documents and are best understood in context of the overall Cloud NGFW architecture:
Cloud NGFW for AWS Administration Guide: This is the primary resource for understanding Cloud NGFW. It details deployment, configuration, and management, covering the roles of the Cloud NGFW resource, rulestacks, and the underlying inspection engine. You can find this documentation on the Palo Alto Networks support portal by searching for "Cloud NGFW for AWS Administration Guide".
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