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New A32 version of Network Security Policy Management Suite deepens visibility and control over hybrid environments, enables secure micro-segmentation deployment and delivers enhanced SDN and SD-WAN integrations AlgoSec Strengthens and Simplifies Cloud and SDN Security Management New A32 version of Network Security Policy Management Suite deepens visibility and control over hybrid environments, enables secure micro-segmentation deployment and delivers enhanced SDN and SD-WAN integrations January 12, 2021 Speak to one of our experts RIDGEFIELD PARK, N.J., January 12, 2021 – AlgoSec , the leading provider of business-driven network security management solutions, has introduced enhanced application visibility and auto-discovery features, and extended its integrations with leading SDN and SD-WAN solutions, in the new version of its core Network Security Management Suite. AlgoSec A32 gives IT and security experts the most comprehensive visibility and control over security across their entire hybrid environment. It enables organizations to align and manage their network security from a business perspective, giving them new automation capabilities for seamless, zero-touch security management across SDN, cloud and on-premise networks from a single platform. The key benefits that AlgoSec A32 delivers to IT, network and security experts include: Enable secure deployment of micro-segmentation in complex hybrid networks A32 automates identifying and mapping of the attributes, flows and rules that support business-critical applications across hybrid networks with the built-in AutoDiscovery capability. This accelerates organizations’ ability to make changes to their applications across the enterprise’s heterogeneous on-premise and cloud platforms, and to troubleshoot network or change management issues – ensuring continuous security and compliance. Align and manage all network security processes from a single platform A32 gives organizations instant visibility, risk detection, and mitigation for network or cloud misconfigurations, and simplifies security policies with central management and clean-up capabilities. This makes it easy to plan and implement micro-segmentation strategies to enhance security network-wide. Seamlessly integrate with leading SDN and SD-WAN solutions for enhanced visibility and compliance A32 seamlessly integrates with leading SDN and SD-WAN solutions including Cisco ACI, Cisco Meraki and VMWARE NSX-T to enhance visibility and ensure ongoing compliance with extended support for financial regulations such as SWIFT and HKMA. “The events of 2020 have highlighted how critical it is for network security experts to be able to make changes to their organizations’ core business applications quickly, but without impacting security or compliance across complex, hybrid networks,” said Eran Shiff, Vice President, Product, of AlgoSec. “AlgoSec A32 gives IT and security teams the holistic visibility and granular control they need over their entire network to do this, enabling them to plan, check and automatically implement changes from a single console to maximize business agility and strengthen security and compliance.” AlgoSec A32 is the first version to run on the CentOS 7 operating system and is generally available . About AlgoSec The leading provider of business-driven network security management solutions, AlgoSec helps the world’s largest organizations align security with their mission-critical business processes. With AlgoSec, users can discover, map and migrate business application connectivity, proactively analyze risk from the business perspective, tie cyber-attacks to business processes and intelligently automate network security changes with zero touch – across their cloud, SDN and on-premise networks. Over 1,800 enterprises , including 20 of the Fortune 50, have utilized AlgoSec’s solutions to make their organizations more agile, more secure and more compliant – all the time. Since 2005, AlgoSec has shown its commitment to customer satisfaction with the industry’s only money-back guarantee . All product and company names herein may be trademarks of their registered owners. *** Media Contacts:Tsippi [email protected] Craig CowardContext Public [email protected] +44 (0)1625 511 966

Survey finds that 58% of respondents are concerned about security in the cloud, while misconfigurations are one of the leading causes of breaches and outages as public cloud adoption doubles over past two years Cloud Security Alliance Releases Latest Survey Report on State of Cloud Security Concerns, Challenges, and Incidents Survey finds that 58% of respondents are concerned about security in the cloud, while misconfigurations are one of the leading causes of breaches and outages as public cloud adoption doubles over past two years March 30, 2021 Speak to one of our experts SEATTLE – March 30, 2021 – The Cloud Security Alliance (CSA), the world’s leading organization dedicated to defining and raising awareness of best practices to help ensure a secure cloud computing environment, and AlgoSec , a leading provider of business-driven network and cloud security management solutions, today announced the results of a new study titled, “ State of Cloud Security Concerns, Challenges, and Incidents .” The survey, which queried nearly 1,900 IT and security professionals from a variety of organization sizes and locations, sought to gain deeper insight into the complex cloud environment that continues to emerge and that has only grown more complex since the onset of the pandemic. The survey found that over half of organizations are running 41 percent or more of their workloads in public clouds, compared to just one-quarter in 2019. In 2021, 63 percent of respondents expect to be running 41 percent or more of their workloads in public cloud, indicating that adoption of public cloud will only continue. Sixty-two percent of respondents use more than one cloud provider, and the diversity of production workloads (e.g. container platforms, virtual machines) is also expected to increase. Key findings include: Security tops concerns with cloud projects : Respondents’ leading concerns over cloud adoption were network security (58%), a lack of cloud expertise (47%), migrating workloads to the cloud (44%), and insufficient staff to manage cloud environments (32%). It’s notable that a total of 79 percent of respondents reported staff-related issues, highlighting that organizations are struggling with handling cloud deployments and a largely remote workforce. Cloud issues and misconfigurations are leading causes of breaches and outages : Eleven percent of respondents reported a cloud security incident in the past year with the three most common causes being cloud provider issues (26%), security misconfigurations (22%), and attacks such as denial of service exploits (20%). When asked about the impact of their most disruptive cloud outages, 24 percent said it took up to 3 hours to restore operations, and for 26 percent it took more than half a day. Nearly one-third still manage cloud security manually : Fifty-two percent of respondents stated they use cloud-native tools to manage security as part of their application orchestration process, and 50 percent reported using orchestration and configuration management tools such as Ansible, Chef and Puppet. Twenty-nine percent said they use manual processes to manage cloud security. Who controls cloud security is not clear-cut : Thirty-five percent of respondents said their security operations team managed cloud security, followed by the cloud team (18%), and IT operations (16%). Other teams such as network operations, DevOps and application owners all fell below 10 percent, showing confusion over exactly who owns public cloud security. “The use of cloud services has continued to increase over the past decade. Particularly now, in the wake of the COVID-19 public health crisis. With organizations struggling to address a largely remote workforce, many enterprises’ digital transformations have been accelerated to enable employees to work from home,” said Hillary Baron, lead author and research analyst, Cloud Security Alliance. “As an ever-more complex cloud environment continues to evolve, the need for supplementary security tools to improve public cloud security will, as well.” “In the face of complex environments, a dearth of security staff, and an overall lack of cloud knowledge, organizations are turning to security tools that can help supplement their workforce. Three of the top four benefits organizations look for in security management tools involve proactive detection of risks and automation. These types of tools can supplement the challenges many organizations are experiencing with lack of expertise (47%) and staff (32%), as well as improve visibility as they move toward an ever-changing cloud environment,” said Jade Kahn, AlgoSec Chief Marketing Officer.AlgoSec commissioned the survey to add to the industry’s knowledge about hybrid-cloud and multi-cloud security. Sponsors of CSA research are CSA Corporate Members, who support the findings of the research project but have no added influence on content development nor editing rights. The report and its findings are vendor-agnostic and allow for global participation. Download the free eBook now. About Cloud Security Alliance The Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) is the world’s leading organization dedicated to defining and raising awareness of best practices to help ensure a secure cloud computing environment. CSA harnesses the subject matter expertise of industry practitioners, associations, governments, and its corporate and individual members to offer cloud security-specific research, education, training, certification, events, and products. CSA’s activities, knowledge, and extensive network benefit the entire community impacted by cloud — from providers and customers to governments, entrepreneurs, and the assurance industry — and provide a forum through which different parties can work together to create and maintain a trusted cloud ecosystem. For further information, visit us at www.cloudsecurityalliance.org , and follow us on Twitter @cloudsa. About AlgoSec The leading provider of business-driven network security management solutions, AlgoSec helps the world’s largest organizations align security with their mission-critical business processes. With AlgoSec, users can discover, map and migrate business application connectivity, proactively analyze risk from the business perspective, tie cyber-attacks to business processes and intelligently automate network security changes with zero touch – across their cloud, SDN and on-premise networks. Over 1,800 enterprises, including 20 of the Fortune 50, have utilized AlgoSec’s solutions to make their organizations more agile, more secure and more compliant – all the time. Since 2005, AlgoSec has shown its commitment to customer satisfaction with the industry’s only money-back guarantee. www.algosec.com

AlgoSec’s latest product release provides organizations with enhanced application connectivity visibility, effective security, and continuous compliance with the most recent regulations across their multi-cloud environments. Ensure up to date compliance and tighten your hybrid network security posture with AlgoSec A32.60 AlgoSec’s latest product release provides organizations with enhanced application connectivity visibility, effective security, and continuous compliance with the most recent regulations across their multi-cloud environments. September 13, 2023 Speak to one of our experts RIDGEFIELD PARK, N.J., September 13, 2023 – AlgoSec, a global cybersecurity leader, introduces AlgoSec A32.60, the latest in application connectivity security and compliance. AlgoSec A32.60 provides an effective solution for organizations to secure application connectivity in their hybrid and multi-cloud estate. A32.60 integrates cloud security visibility into AlgoSec’s security management platform and enables organizations to ensure ongoing compliance with industry regulatory standards. The key benefits that AlgoSec A32.60 delivers to network and security experts include: Enhanced visibility and security of north-south network traffic: New integration with Palo Alto Prisma Access, now encompassing mobile user policies within the Prisma access fabric. New integration and support for SD-WAN Versa Networks, offering extended visibility into network connectivity and an intuitive topology map. Ensuring ongoing regulatory compliance: Enhanced ISO 27001 report with the latest 2022 standards, allowing organizations to ensure alignment with the most current regulations. Integration of a new ECB (European Central Bank) regulations report, allowing companies to confidently navigate evolving compliance requirements. Integrating cloud security visibility into network security policy management: Expanded integration with Microsoft Azure firewall enables centralized visibility across both cloud and traditional firewalls, all within a single, unified management solution. New automation support for Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) objects in Palo Alto Panorama, Fortinet FortiManager, and Check Point. This allows users to efficiently manage and secure their network resources while embracing the flexibility of cloud environments. About AlgoSec AlgoSec, a global cybersecurity leader, empowers organizations to secure application connectivity by automating connectivity flows and security policy, anywhere. The AlgoSec platform enables the world’s most complex organizations to gain visibility, reduce risk, achieve compliance at the application-level and process changes at zero-touch across the hybrid network. AlgoSec’s patented application-centric view of the hybrid network enables business owners, application owners, and information security professionals to talk the same language, so organizations can deliver business applications faster while achieving a heightened security posture. Over 1,800 of the world’s leading organizations trust AlgoSec to help secure their most critical workloads across public cloud, private cloud, containers, and on-premises networks. See what securely accelerating your digital transformation, move-to-cloud, infrastructure modernization, or micro-segmentation initiatives looks like at www.algosec.com

Annual vendor-agnostic research found businesses continue to prioritize multi-cloud environments, with Cisco, Microsoft Azure, AWS, Palo Alto Networks and Fortinet leading the way AlgoSec’s 2025 State of Network Security Report Reveals Growing Adoption of Zero-Trust Architecture and Multi-Cloud Environments Annual vendor-agnostic research found businesses continue to prioritize multi-cloud environments, with Cisco, Microsoft Azure, AWS, Palo Alto Networks and Fortinet leading the way April 3, 2025 Speak to one of our experts RIDGEFIELD PARK, NJ, April 3, 2025 – Global cybersecurity leader AlgoSec has released its annual ‘The State of Network Security Report’, providing a comprehensive and objective, vendor-agnostic analysis of today’s network security landscape by identifying key market trends, highlighting in demand solutions and technologies and the most popular strategies being adopted by security professionals. The report identifies significant shifts in cloud platform adoption, deployment of firewalls and Software- Defined Wide Area Networks (SD-WAN), as well as Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) implementation and AI. Based on comparative findings from 2024 and 2025, AlgoSec’s research includes responses from security, network and cloud professionals across 28 countries and evaluates market leaders including Cisco, Microsoft Azure, AWS, Check Point, Palo Alto Networks and more. Key findings from the report include: Security visibility gaps are driving a shift in security management - 71% of security teams struggle with visibility, which is delaying threat detection and response. The lack of insight into application connectivity, security policies and dependencies are proving to be a significant risk Multi-cloud and cloud firewalls are now standard – Businesses continue to adopt multi-cloud environments, with Azure becoming the most widely used platform in 2025. Firewall and SD-WAN adoption grow despite complexity – Multi-vendor strategies make firewall deployment more challenging. In terms of customer base, Palo Alto Networks took the lead, but Fortinet’s NGFW is gaining traction. SD-WAN adoption jumped, with Fortinet rising from 19.1% in 2024 to 25.8% in 2025. Zero-trust and SASE gain momentum – Zero-trust awareness is at an all-time high, with 56% of businesses fully or partially implementing it, though 20% are still in the learning phase. SASE adoption is also growing, with Zscaler leading at 35%, while Netskope has gained 15% market share. AI and automation are reshaping security – AI-driven security tools are improving real-time threat detection, but implementation and privacy concerns remain a challenge. Automation is now critical, with application connectivity automation ranked as the top priority for minimizing risk and downtime. “As businesses expand their digital footprints across hybrid and multi-cloud environments, securing network infrastructure has become a top challenge,” said Eran Shiff, VP of Product at AlgoSec. “We are seeing a major shift toward automation, orchestration and risk mitigation as key security priorities. Adoption of SD-WAN and SASE continues to rise, while awareness of AI-driven security and zero-trust principles is stronger than ever.” The full report can be accessed here. About AlgoSec AlgoSec, a global cybersecurity leader, empowers organizations to securely accelerate application delivery up to 10 times faster by automating application connectivity and security policy across the hybrid network environment. With two decades of expertise securing hybrid networks, over 2200 of the worlds most complex organizations trust AlgoSec to help secure their most critical workloads. AlgoSec Horizon platform utilizes advanced AI capabilities, enabling users to automatically discover and identify their business applications across multi-clouds, and remediate risks more effectively. It serves as a single source for visibility into security and compliance issues across the hybrid network environment, to ensure ongoing adherence to internet security standards, industry, and internal regulations. Additionally, organizations can leverage intelligent change automation to streamline security change processes, thus improving security and agility. Learn how AlgoSec enables application owners, information security experts, SecOps and cloud security teams to deploy business applications faster while maintaining security at www.algosec.com .

New appointments from well-established cybersecurity companies underscore AlgoSec’s mission to be the global leader in securing application connectivity AlgoSec Names Rafi Kretchmer as Chief Marketing Officer, and Mike Danforth as New Regional Vice President of Sales New appointments from well-established cybersecurity companies underscore AlgoSec’s mission to be the global leader in securing application connectivity May 30, 2024 Speak to one of our experts RIDGEFIELD PARK, NJ, May 30, 2024 – AlgoSec , a global cybersecurity leader, today announced the appointment of two senior executives: Rafi Kretchmer will serve as Chief Marketing Officer, and Mike Danforth will assume the role of Regional Vice President of Sales for the America’s. Together these new leaders will further support AlgoSec in enabling the world’s most complex organizations to secure their business-critical applications across the public clouds, private clouds, containers, and on-premises networks; ensuring application uptime, risk management and continuous compliance. “The addition of Rafi Kretchmer and Mike Danforth to our executive team marks a significant milestone in establishing AlgoSec as a leading global cybersecurity company,” said Yuval Baron, Chairman and CEO of AlgoSec . “With their deep expertise and tenure in the cybersecurity industry, Kretchmer and Danforth will be instrumental in leveraging their expertise to provide customers with the solutions they need to deliver business applications faster while achieving a heightened security posture.” Combined, Kretchmer and Danforth have over 40 years of cybersecurity experience, including senior leadership roles at globally-recognized cybersecurity organizations. ● Rafi Kretchmer , Chief Marketing Officer – Rafi Kretchmer has more than two decades of extensive experience heading marketing and strategy for leading global B2B enterprises, with a proven track record of driving strategic business growth across global markets. Prior to joining AlgoSec, Rafi Kretchmer served as Vice President of Marketing at Check Point Software Technologies, Ltd. Prior to that, he held multiple senior marketing leadership roles in the SaaS market, including Chief Marketing Officer at Panaya, and Head of Marketing at Nice Systems and Amdocs. ● Mike Danforth , Regional Vice President of Sales, America’s – Mike Danforth brings 20 years of sales experience across the cybersecurity landscape. He has comprehensive experience with direct sales, channel sales and strategic partnerships. Throughout his tenure, Danforth has held several key leadership positions at start-ups and large public companies. Most recently, he served as Vice President of Sales for Palo Alto Networks, helping to build the Cortex product line to a billion-dollar business unit across every major sales vertical in the U.S., Canada, and LATAM. Before his career in cybersecurity, Mike also served 10 years in the U.S. Army as a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division and later as a Leader in the prestigious 75th Ranger Regiment. Today’s security leaders must maintain a strong security posture against the increase in and constantly evolving landscape of cybersecurity threats , while also maintaining business continuity. The appointments of Kretchmer and Danforth will advance AlgoSec’s commitment to ensuring customers have the tools they need to securely accelerate business application deployment and accelerate digital transformation projects. For more information about AlgoSec and its leadership team, please visit algosec.com/company/management/ and follow the company on Twitter , LinkedIn and Facebook . About AlgoSec AlgoSec, a global cybersecurity leader, empowers organizations to secure application connectivity and cloud-native applications throughout their multi-cloud and hybrid network. Trusted by more than 1,800 of the world’s leading organizations, AlgoSec’s application-centric approach enables to securely accelerate business application deployment by centrally managing application connectivity and security policies across the public clouds, private clouds, containers, and on-premises networks. Using its unique vendor-agnostic deep algorithm for intelligent change management automation, AlgoSec enables acceleration of digital transformation projects, helps prevent business application downtime and substantially reduces manual work and exposure to security risks. AlgoSec’s policy management and CNAPP platforms provide a single source for visibility into security and compliance issues within cloud-native applications as well as across the hybrid network environment, to ensure ongoing adherence to internet security standards, industry, and internal regulations. Learn how AlgoSec enables application owners, information security experts, DevSecOps and cloud security teams to deploy business applications up to 10 times faster while maintaining security at https://www.algosec.com .

Security Policy Management with Professor Wool Next Generation Firewalls Next Generation Firewalls (NGFWs) with Professor Wool is a whiteboard-style series of lessons that examine the some of the challenges of and provide technical tips for managing security policies on NGFWs across in evolving enterprise networks and data centers. Lesson 1 In this lesson, Professor Wool examines next-generation firewalls and the granular capabilities they provide for improved control over applications and users. Next-Generation Firewalls: Overview of Application and User-Aware Policies Watch Lesson 2 In this lesson, Professor Wool examines the pros and cons of whitelisting and blacklisting policies and offers some recommendations on policy considerations. NGFWs – Whitelisting & Blacklisting Policy Considerations Watch Lesson 3 Next generation firewalls (NGFWs) allow you to manage security policies with much greater granularity, based on specific applications and users, which provides much greater control over the traffic you want to allow or deny. Today, NGFWs are usually deployed alongside traditional firewalls. Therefore change requests need to be written using each firewall type’s specific terminology; application names and default ports for NGFWs, and actual protocols and ports for traditional firewalls. This new lesson explains some of challenges of writing firewall rules for a mixed firewall environment, and how to address them. Managing Your Security Policy in a Mixed Next Gen and Traditional Firewall Environment Watch Lesson 4 As part of the blacklisting approach to application security, most NGFW vendors now offer their customers a subscription based service that provides periodic updates to firewall definitions and signatures for a great number of applications especially the malicious ones. In this lesson, Professor Wool discusses the pros and cons of this offering for cyber threat prevention. It also discusses the limitations of this service when home-grown applications are deployed in the enterprise, and provides a recommendation on how to solve this problem. Using Next Generation Firewalls for Cyber Threat Prevention Watch Have a Question for Professor Wool? Ask him now Choose a better way to manage your network Choose a better way to manage your network Work email* First name* Last name* Company* country* Select country... Short answer* By submitting this form, I accept AlgoSec's privacy policy Continue

Optimize cloud security and management with AlgoSec Cloud for Microsoft Azure, providing visibility, compliance, and automation for your hybrid cloud environment. AlgoSec Cloud for Microsoft Azure ---- ------- Schedule a Demo Select a size ----- Get the latest insights from the experts Choose a better way to manage your network

Explore Algosec's customer success stories to see how organizations worldwide improve security, compliance, and efficiency with our solutions. Leading payment solutions company credits AlgoSec for increasing security and compliance Organization Payment Solutions Industry Financial Services Headquarters Download case study Share Customer
success stories "Leading fintech company rapidly improves security and compliance with AlgoSec jumpstart program" Background The company is one of the largest payment solutions providers, with offices processing more than 28 billion transactions worldwide. The company services 800,000 merchant outlets that generate $120 billion in processing volume. Its businesses include credit card processing, merchant acquisition and issuance of bank credit cards. The company grew to its enormous size through innovation and acquisition. It has introduced modern technology into the payments industry and has acquired many innovative companies over the last three decades. Challenges Today, the company operates 10 data centers with varying security architectures and firewall equipment from different vendors. The security staff is currently in the process of a cross-company firewall consolidation that will take several years to complete. The company is automating its change management of firewall rules to cut down on the time and effort spent on researching and implementing rules to keep up with its fast growth. It deploys rule changes during tight, scheduled “push windows” and conducts compliance reviews twice per year. The firewall change process is highly complex with many steps: Request Design Peer Review Management Approval Implementation Validation Success for the security team is all about time. They seek to automate the process by reducing time spent on: Research and writing rules Peer reviews Staging Security peering after staging Firewall push window requirements Quarterly firewall ruleset reviews as part of compliance objectives Solution The security team acquired AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer (AFA) and deployed it at two of its data centers in Arizona and Colorado. In both locations, the company is in the process of firewall migration to consolidate on one vendor. However, they need to add firewall clusters one at a time after each migration instead of all at once. The company took advantage of AlgoSec’s Jumpstart Program that delivers the benefits of AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer in conjunction with other AlgoSec solutions quickly. With Jumpstart, the company is quickly able to: Automate the discovery and mapping of enterprise applications Automate the change management processes Adopt the new processes across the company Realize rapid ROI The company’s lead security infrastructure consultant proclaimed, “AlgoSec customized their Jumpstart Program just for us. Their people are engaged, personable, skilled and highly efficient. They became part of our team dedicated to our success.” In addition to getting Firewall Analyzer up and running quickly and delivering its benefits, the Jumpstart team’s AFA deployment immediately identified network security gaps and helped the company close them, making them more secure and compliant. Results AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer is achieving all the goals of the security team. Time for policy writing reduced from 90 hours to 15 hours – 83% less Cut the total process time by half, enabling the security team to keep up with the barrage of change requests. Reduced the admin overhead from 30 to 4 – 87% less “Automation is definitely the way to go,” declared their security consultant. “We can now stay on top of the process even while we migrate our firewalls. We are looking for more from AlgoSec.” The company is now in the process of implementing AlgoSec FireFlow (AFF) to enhance the existing change management system with intelligent network and security automation. AlgoSec FireFlow enforces compliance and automatically documents the entire change-management lifecycle. Some of the features include: Processing of firewall changes with zero-touch automation Elimination of mistakes and rework, and improvement of accountability for change requests Proactive assessment of the impact of network changes to ensure security and continuous compliance Automation of the rule–recertification processes Schedule time with one of our experts

Explore Algosec's customer success stories to see how organizations worldwide improve security, compliance, and efficiency with our solutions. SANOFI FINDS THE CURE FOR TIME-CONSUMING APPLICATION MIGRATION WITH ALGOSEC Organization Sanofi Industry Healthcare & Pharmaceuticals Headquarters Paris, France Download case study Share Customer
success stories "Using AlgoSec during our data center migration allowed us to give technical project leaders access to all of the rules involved in the migration of their applications, which reduced the IT security team’s time on these projects by 80%. The application was very useful, simple to use and made everybody happy." AlgoSec Business Impact Simplify data center migration projects Reduce rule migration process time by 80% Streamline and improve firewall operations Background A multinational pharmaceutical company, Sanofi, has 112 industrial sites in 41 countries and operations in more than 100 countries. The company’s 110,000 employees are committed to protecting health, enhancing life, providing hope and responding to the potential healthcare needs of seven billion people around the world. Challenge The sensitive nature of Sanofi’s business and its wide ranging global operations require an extensive and well secured network, which currently has 120 firewalls all over the world. In the midst of a data center consolidation project, the company needed to understand how its security devices would be affected by application migrations. Sanofi was also eager to improve change management processes and gain key performance indicators (KPIs) for risk analysis.“Our main concern with the data center consolidation project was to enable various technical project leaders to see the different rules impacting the migration of their applications, and to avoid any outages. For that, we needed pre-migration and post-migration documentation on security,” says Bruno Roulleau, Network Security Architect at Sanofi. “We also needed metrics on the risk associated with different policies on the firewalls.” Solution When looking for a solution, Sanofi evaluated several vendors. “A key point for us was the ability to easily integrate the security devices in our current infrastructure, into the solution. We also wanted detailed reporting that would allow us to delegate policy management to project leaders,” Roulleau notes.Because Sanofi constantly upgrades its devices, its systems need to evolve and incorporate the new devices and rules seamlessly. “We chose the AlgoSec Security Management solution because its graphical interface is very user-friendly, it easily supports new devices and generates detailed reports and metrics on risks,” says Roulleau.Sanofi also appreciated AlgoSec’s flexibility. “AlgoSec is very open to developing new capabilities. We can ask to have some new features available by a certain date and they will deliver on time,” according to Roulleau. For a company with a complex network and rapidly evolving security needs, that responsiveness proved key to the decision to go with AlgoSec. Results Sanofi’s security team is now able to delegate responsibility for rule changes both during migration and on an ongoing basis. “Using AlgoSec during our data center migration allowed us to give technical project leaders access to all of the rules involved in the migration of their applications, which reduced the IT security team’s time on these projects by 80%. The application was very useful, simple to use and made everybody happy,” Roulleau says.Additionally, with AlgoSec’s reports Sanofi can now easily and clearly document the status of their firewalls as well as the impact of any changes on the network throughout the migration project. “We can now generate detailed reports in just three clicks!” Roulleau adds.Furthermore, AlgoSec’s optimization reports enabled Sanofi to clean up its security policies. Because they could clearly see all of the rules and their impact on network security, Roulleau’s team was able to safely eliminate unused and duplicate rules, which increased the efficiency of the firewalls. Those reports also provided insight into the risks associated with the current system and various changes being made. Schedule time with one of our experts

Last week our CTO, Professor Avishai Wool, presented a technical webinar on the do’s and don’ts for managing external connectivity to and... Auditing and Compliance 4 tips to manage your external network connections Joanne Godfrey 2 min read Joanne Godfrey Short bio about author here Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetur. Vitae donec tincidunt elementum quam laoreet duis sit enim. Duis mattis velit sit leo diam. Tags Share this article 8/10/15 Published Last week our CTO, Professor Avishai Wool, presented a technical webinar on the do’s and don’ts for managing external connectivity to and from your network . We kicked off our webinar by polling the audience (186 people) on how many external permanent connections into their enterprise network they have. 40% have less than 50 external connections 31% have 50-250 external connections 24% have more than 250 external connections 5% wish they knew how many external connections they have! Clearly this is a very relevant issue for many enterprises, and one which can have a profound effect on security. The webinar covered a wide range of best practices for managing the external connectivity lifecycle and I highly recommend that you view the full presentation. But in the meantime, here are a few key issues that you should be mindful of when considering how to manage external connectivity to and from your network: Network Segmentation While there has to be an element of trust when you let an external partner into your network, you must do all you can to protect your organization from attacks through these connections. These include placing your servers in a demilitarized zone (DMZ), segregating them by firewalls, restricting traffic in both directions from the DMZ as well as using additional controls such as web application firewalls, data leak prevention and intrusion detection. Regulatory Compliance Bear in mind that if the data being accessed over the external connection is regulated, both your systems and the related peer’s systems are now subject t. So if the network connection touches credit card data, both sides of the connection are in scope, and outsourcing the processing and management of regulated data to a partner does not let you off the hook. Maintenance Sometimes you will have to make changes to your external connections, either due to planned maintenance work by your IT team or the peer’s team, or as a result of unplanned outages. Dealing with changes that affect external connections is more complicated than internal maintenance, as it will probably require coordinating with people outside your organisation and tweaking existing workflows, while adhering to any contractual or SLA obligations. As part of this process, remember that you’ll need to ensure that your information systems allow your IT teams to recognize external connections and provide access to the relevant technical information in the contract, while supporting the amended workflows. Contracts In most cases there is a contract that governs all aspects of the external connection – including technical and business issues. The technical points will include issues such as IP addresses and ports, technical contact points, SLAs, testing procedures and the physical location of servers. It’s important, therefore, that this contract is adhered to whenever dealing with technical issues related to external connections. These are just a few tips and issues to be aware of. To watch the webinar from Professor Wool in full, check out the recording here . Schedule a demo Related Articles Q1 at AlgoSec: What innovations and milestones defined our start to 2026? AlgoSec Reviews Mar 19, 2023 · 2 min read 2025 in review: What innovations and milestones defined AlgoSec’s transformative year in 2025? AlgoSec Reviews Mar 19, 2023 · 2 min read Navigating Compliance in the Cloud AlgoSec Cloud Mar 19, 2023 · 2 min read Speak to one of our experts Speak to one of our experts Work email* First name* Last name* Company* country* Select country... Short answer* By submitting this form, I accept AlgoSec's privacy policy Schedule a call

Understand the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA). Learn key requirements, best practices, and how to achieve and maintain FISMA compliance. FISMA compliance defined: Requirements & best practices ---- ------- Schedule a Demo Select a size ----- Get the latest insights from the experts Use these six best practices to simplify compliance and risk mitigation with the AlgoSec platform White paper Learn how AlgoSec can help you pass PCI-DSS Audits and ensure continuous compliance Solution overview See how this customer improved compliance readiness and risk management with AlgoSec Case study Choose a better way to manage your network

Learn how firewall rules secure your network from cyber threats. Explore types, best practices, and management strategies to optimize your firewall security. Firewall rules & requirements (inbound vs. outbound) How to secure your network from threats? The cybersecurity landscape is increasingly volatile, with a massive rise in cyberattacks. Malicious cyber actors are relentlessly scouring the internet for vulnerable networks. Any company that wants to keep its network secure must implement a network security solution – a firewall. Cyber attackers keep evolving and finding ways to compromise security systems. As a result, companies need to implement and maintain security best practices. Installing a firewall is not enough; you have to take a step further to ensure the firewall rules are up-to-date and properly managed. If you want to learn how firewall rules work and secure your network from threats, keep reading! This article covers everything you need to know, including types of firewall rules, examples of firewall rules, and firewall rule best practices. Schedule a Demo What are firewall rules? Firewall rules are the major components of firewall policies that determine which types of traffic your firewall allows in and out of your network, and which are blocked. They are access control mechanisms that firewalls use to protect your network from being infiltrated by malicious or unauthorized traffic. Firewall rules examine the control information in individual packets, and either block or allow them based on a set of rules or predetermined criteria. These predetermined criteria or rule components include a source IP address, a destination IP address, ports, protocol type (TCP, UDP, or ICMP), and services. Firewall rules control how the firewalls prevent malicious programs and unauthorized traffic from compromising your network. So properly managing your firewall rules across your infrastructures is instrumental to securing your network from threats. Schedule a Demo How do firewall rules work? A firewall examines each incoming and outgoing data packet and matches it against the firewall rules. A packet is allowed to go through to its destination if it matches one of the rules that allow traffic. If a packet matches none of the rulesor hit a rule with deny, it is rejected. The rejection or mismatch is reported if the firewall is configured to do so. Firewalls are programmed to work with access control lists (ACLs). ACLs contain lists of permissions that determine network traffic that is allowed or blocked. An access control list details the conditions a data packet must meet before the ACL action (allow, deny, or reject) can be executed. To help you understand how firewall rules work, here’s a practical example: if a firewall rule states that traffic to destination N should be allowed only if it is from IP address M, the firewall will check the packet source and destination of incoming packets, and allow packets that meet the M & N rule to go through. If its packet’s destination is N but its source is unidentified or different from M, it is blocked. Packets are checked against firewall rules from top to bottom, and the first rule that matches the packet overrides the other rules below. The last rule is Deny Rest. This means that all packets not expressly permitted by the rules are blocked. You can create a firewall rule in pfSense. pfSense is an open-source firewall and router with unified threat management, load balancing, multi-WAN, a DNS Resolver, and a VPN. It supports a wide range of network technologies, including IPv4 & IPv6 addresses and pfBlockerNG. Other firewalls you can use to create firewall rules include Zenarmor, Windows Defender, and iptables. Schedule a Demo Why are firewall rules important? Firewall rules help network administrators to regulate access to networks. With firewall rules, you can determine what is allowed in and out of your network. For example, they prevent dangerous files like worms and viruses from accessing your network and consuming bandwidth. When it comes to protecting devices that operate within your network, firewall rules establish an essential line of defense. Firewalls (and other security measures like endpoint protection and security certifications) prevent malicious actors from accessing and compromising devices connected to your network or operating inside your network’s environment. Firewall rules help you comply with regulatory standards. Depending on your industry, relevant regulatory agencies expect your company to maintain a certain level of security. For example, if your business is located in the EU region or collects personal data of EU citizens, it is mandated to comply with GDPR. Schedule a Demo What are the main types of firewall rules? There are various types of firewall rules. They are categorized based on the type of security architecture under consideration. That being said, here are some of the major types of firewall rules: 1. Access rule As the name implies, this firewall rule blocks or grants access to inbound and outbound traffic based on certain conditions. The source address, destination address, port number, and protocol are key information that the access rule evaluates to determine whether access should be given or denied. 2. Network address translation (NAT) rule NAT helps you hide the original IP address of a private network – enabling you to protect your network. It makes traffic routing easier and smoothens the inflow & outflow of traffic to and from your network. 3. Application level gateways This type of firewall rule enables network administrators to implement policies that protect your internal network. Application-level gateways function as shields or gatekeepers between your internal network and the public internet. Administrators use them to regulate access to public networks, block some sites, limit access to certain content, and regulate devices allowed to access your network. 4. Stateful packet filtering This rule evaluates data packets and filters them against preset conditions. The traffic is denied access if it fails to meet the requirements outlined by the predetermined security criteria. 5. Circle-level gateways Circle-level gateways do not filter individual packets but rather monitor TCP handshakes to determine whether a session is legitimate and the remote system is considered trusted. Consequently, these gateways provide anonymity to your internal network. Schedule a Demo What is an example of a firewall rule? Firewall rules frequently consist of a source address, source port, destination address, destination port, and an action that determines whether to Allow or Deny the packet. In the following firewall ruleset example, the firewall is never directly accessed from the public network. This is because hackers who can directly access the firewall, can modify or delete rules and allow unwanted travel. Source addressSource portDestination addressDestination portAction AnyAny10.10.10.1AnyDenyAnyAny10.10.10.2AnyDeny10.10.10.1AnyAnyAnyDeny10.10.10.2AnyAnyAnyDeny In the following firewall ruleset example, all traffic from the trusted network is allowed out. This ruleset should be placed below the ruleset above. Since firewall rules are checked from top to bottom, specific rules should be placed before rules that are more general. Source addressSource portDestination addressDestination portAction 10.10.10.0AnyAnyAnyAllow Schedule a Demo What are the best ways to manage firewall rules? Effective management of firewall rules is necessary to avoid conflicting configurations and ensure your security infrastructure is powerful enough to ward off malicious attacks. To manage firewall rules better, do the following: ● Maintain proper documentation Properly document policies, rules, and workflows. It’s difficult for your network administrators to stay organized and manage firewall rules without proper documentation. Implement a strict documentation policy that mandates administrators to document policies and configuration changes. This improves visibility and ensures seamless continuity even if a key network operator leaves the company. ● Assign tasks with caution Ensure that only well-trained network operators have the privilege to assign and alter firewall rules. Allowing everyone on your security team to assign and change firewall rules increases the chances of misconfiguration. Giving such a privilege to a select few does the opposite and makes containing mismanagement easier. ● Use a standardized naming convention It’s easy to get confused about which configuration does what. This is more likely to happen where there is no naming convention. To avoid conflicting configurations, name each rule to clarify its purpose. By clearly defining the rules, conflicts can be easily resolved. ● Flag temporary rules Some rules are created to function just for a while – temporary rules. To keep things simple and ‘neat,’ flag temporary rules so they can be eliminated when they are no longer required. ● Order your rules Order rules in a specific pattern. For example, begin with global rules and narrow down to user-specific rules. ● Use a firewall management solution Many administrators use a firewall management and orchestration solution to streamline the firewall rule management process. The solution integrates with your firewall and uses built-in automation for managing firewall settings and configurations from a single dashboard. A firewall management tool helps you automate activities, gain visibility on all firewall rules, optimize firewall rules, remove rule anomalies, generate reports, etc. Schedule a Demo What are the best practices for firewall rules? To ensure your firewall works properly and offers the best security possible, there are some key best practices you have to follow when configuring and managing firewall rules: Review the firewall rules regularly The cyber threat landscape is always changing. Therefore, you must regularly review the firewall rules to ensure they provide optimal security against threats. Reviewing firewall rules helps you to be several steps ahead of malicious cyber actors, remove rule anomalies, and maintain compliance. Cyber attackers are relentlessly devising new ways to compromise security systems, infiltrate networks & subnets, and wreak havoc. You need to update the firewall rules regularly to counter new attacks. Obsolete rules can be maneuvered and the firewall compromised. You have to keep evolving the rules to stay ahead of malicious actors. Remove ineffective, redundant firewall rules. Are there rules that are no longer needed? Are there overlapping rules that are taking up space and confusing your network administrators? Look out for unnecessary configurations and remove them to free up the system and avoid confusion. In addition to helping you keep your network safe, reviewing firewall rules regularly also allows you to maintain compliance with regulatory standards such as HIPAA and GDPR. Keep tabs on firewall logs Keeping an eye on the firewall log helps administrators to monitor traffic flow, identify suspicious activities, and proactively fix challenges. Monitoring firewall logs gives you visibility into your infrastructure, enabling you to get to know your network users and the nature of their activities. Reduce complexity by categorizing firewall rules Make firewall rule structure simple and easy to manage by grouping rules with similar characteristics. This approach reduces configuration complexity, improves ease of administration, and optimizes firewall performance. Implement least-privileged access Do not grant users more privileges than necessary to perform their tasks. This ensures that only an authorized user can create a new rule, change a security policy, or gain access to specific resources. Block high-risk ports Blocking some ports can significantly decrease the risk of a network breach. The following table outlines the ports you should block as recommended by the SANS Institute . The table features services, TCP port, UDP port, port number, and port range. ServicePortPort number NetBIOS in Windows NTTCP and UDP135NetBIOS in Windows NTUDP137 and 138TFTP daemonUDP69HTTP (except to external web services)TCP80SSL (except to external web servers)TCP443Lockd (Linux DoS vulnerability)TCP & UDP4045Common high-order HTTP portsTCP8000, 8080, 8888LDAPTCP & UDP389IMAPTCP143SOCKSTCP1080SNMPUDP161 & 162SyslogUDP514Cisco AUX port (binary)TCP6001NFSTCP & UDP2049X WindowsTCP & UDP6000 – 6255 Schedule a Demo How can AlgoSec help you manage your firewall rules better? Managing firewall rules manually can be overwhelming and time-consuming – especially when dealing with multiple firewall solutions. With the help of a firewall management solution, you easily configure firewall rules and manage configurations from a single dashboard. This is where AlgoSec comes in! AlgoSec’s powerful firewall management solution integrates with your firewalls to deliver unified firewall policy management from a single location, thus streamlining the entire process. With AlgoSec, you can maintain clear visibility of your firewall ruleset, automate the management process, assess risk & optimize rulesets, streamline audit preparation & ensure compliance, and use APIs to access many features through web services. Schedule a Demo Select a size How to secure your network from threats? What are firewall rules? How do firewall rules work? Why are firewall rules important? What are the main types of firewall rules? What is an example of a firewall rule? What are the best ways to manage firewall rules? What are the best practices for firewall rules? How can AlgoSec help you manage your firewall rules better? 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