Strata , Prisma & Cortex || Difference

[Khalid]

Hi, what is the difference b/w Strata, Prisma & cortex, as Strata is only used for Enterprise solution? Prisma for cloud ? in official documentation Strata have also cloud solution then what's the function of Prisma? Strata included specific models of firewalls & Prisma included different models of firewall? How these above three types are divided on which bases.? & Cortex is used for operation what it means? Thanks

[thomas.pollok]

Hi,

Strata, Cortex and Prisma are areas where you can find different PAN solutions.

Strata:

Here you can find the solutions related to the Network Security Platform. So here are the Firewalls as Hardware, VM or CN and Panorama. 

Prisma:

Here we have some cloud services like Prisma Access, SaaS API Security or Prisma Cloud.

Cortex:

Solutions for the SOC like Cortex XDR, XSOAR, Xpanse and XSIAM.

Hope that helps,

Regards

[Khalid]

Thanks for your feedback, in strata we have VM option is we cannot use this for cloud security solution?

[BPry]

@Khalid,

You can use the VM-series to secure cloud workloads without issue if you design things properly. It's just a grouping for different products really. Strata covers their PAN-OS products where Prisma focuses on their cloud native solutions (IE: SaaS). 

[ParentS]

I realize this is an older thread but this question has vexed me a few times as well.  At-a-glance, there appears to be lot of confusing overlap.
This walkthrough from Josh Levine was helpful: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIERAMvGoWE

There were my takeaway notes:

1. Strata encompasses the firewall and all the features that come with it.

a. PA firewalls and their built-in technologies

b. The "ML-Powered" NG firewalls

c. VM-Series firewalls

d. CN-Series firewalls

e. Panorama

○ Featured technologies

§ App-ID, Content-ID, User-ID, Device-ID

§ DNS Security, URL filtering, Enterprise DLP 

§ Threat Prevention, Wildfire, IOT Security

§ Global Protect, 5G Security, SDWAN

2. Prisma is all about security in the cloud

a. Prisma Cloud

i. Cloud security posture management

ii. Cloud workload protection

iii. Cloud IAM security

iv. Cloud code security

v. Compliance and Governance

vi. Web Application and API Security

b. Prisma Access ("SASE" <-- Gartner general term)

i. Basically PANOS in the cloud. 

ii. Allows you to protect users wherever they may be.

iii. You're direction all traffic to "Prisma Access" which pumps it through the protections in Prisma Cloud which includes:

1) ZTNA, CASB, SWG, FWAAS, SDWAN, … etc

c. Prisma SAAS - visibility, compliance, controls and security across SAAS applications and sensitive data in the cloud.

3. Cortex - for detecting and dealing with threats in general; cloud or otherwise.

a. XDR (Extended Detection & Response)

b. XSOAR (Extended Security Orchestration, Automation & Response)

c. Xpanse (attack surface management) 

d. Cyrpsis <---- maybe depreciated and consolidated into newer solutions

e. Data Lake (collecting, deduplicating, normalizing data and feeding into the other solutions).

AutoFocus (cloud-based threat intelligence service. Can use Palo and external sources to gain an insight into threat intel)