Palo Alto Networks, the global cybersecurity leader, has officially announced the launch of Cortex® Cloud, the next version of Prisma Cloud, which natively brings together new releases of its best-in-class cloud detection and response (CDR), along with industry-leading cloud native application protection platform (CNAPP) capabilities on a unified Cortex platform.
According to certain reports, the stated solution makes it possible for security teams to access significant innovations powered by AI and automation that go beyond traditional “peace time” approaches to enhance cloud security and stop attacks in real-time.
To understand the significance of such a development, we must take into account a report from Unit 42, a report where it was revealed that 80% of security exposures were found in cloud attack surfaces, with a 66% increase in threats targeting cloud environments.
In response, Cortex Cloud arrives on the scene bearing the ability to unify data, automate workflows, and apply AI-driven insights, all for the purpose of reducing risk, preventing threats, and stopping attacks in real time. More on that would reveal how the solution is designed to ingest and analyze data from third-party tools, while simultaneously providing centralized visibility, AI-driven insights, and end-to-end remediation across the entire cloud security ecosystem.
Markedly enough, the development in question also revamps the cloud security solution on the AI-driven Cortex SecOps platform to deliver a powerful unified user experience with persona-driven dashboards and workflows, thus building upon Palo Alto Networks platformization strategy. The idea behind doing so is to help customers achieve superior protection at a significantly lower total cost of ownership.
“Security teams need to mitigate risk to reduce the chance of cybersecurity incidents, and if and when an incident occurs, they need to respond as quickly as possible. Our research shows that security teams struggle with remediation efficiency because application security, cloud security, and security operations tools and processes have been historically siloed. With the introduction of Cortex Cloud, Palo Alto Networks delivers a unified code-to-cloud-to-SOC platform giving security teams the context to prioritize and drive remediation actions with the highest impact on reducing risk,” said Melinda Marks, practice director, cybersecurity, Enterprise Strategy Group
Talk about Cortex Cloud on a slightly deeper level, we begin from its promise to provide application security. This includes building secure apps and preventing issues in development before they become production issues that attackers can exploit. You see, the solution basically identifies and prioritizes issues across the entire development pipeline with end-to-end context across code, runtime, cloud, and newly introduced third-party scanners.
Next up, we must dig into the technology’s cloud posture, which enhances multi-cloud risk management with new AI-powered prioritization, guided fixes to resolve multiple risks with a single action, and automated remediation. Furthermore, Cortex Cloud delivers a single user experience with tight integration across all of Prisma Cloud’s cloud posture capabilities.
Another detail worth a mention here is rooted in the solution’s cloud runtime. This translates to mitigating attacks in real time by integrating the unified Cortex XDR agent, backed by new cloud data sources, to prevent threats with advanced analytics, as proven by industry-leading results in the most recent MITRE ATT&CK testing.
Not just that, the new Cloud Runtime Security feature also includes the world’s leading CNAPP capabilities at no extra cost so to maximize adoption of end-to-end cloud security on a single platform.
Rounding up highlights would be the SOC side of things. Cortex Cloud’s SOC offering goes beyond what any SIEM can deliver. This it does using a mix of cloud data, context, and workflows within Cortex XSIAM, a mix which significantly reduces the mean time to respond (MTTR) against modern threats with a single, unified SecOps solution.
“Cloud security must expand to include industry-leading runtime protection. And to make it as easy as possible for our customers to adopt end-to-end cloud security, we’re including CNAPP at no additional cost for every Cortex Cloud Runtime Security customer. With Cortex Cloud, we are delivering the next generation of cloud security — enabling organizations to swiftly prevent, detect, investigate, and respond to evolving threats across their entire enterprise,” said Lee Klarich, chief product officer of Palo Alto Networks.