Monday, May 1, 2017

Taking the Palo Alto Networks Accredited Configuration Engineer (ACE) Exam

I visited New York last Spring 2017 to attend a cousin's wedding. It was one of the most memorable weddings I went to since most of my relatives flew in from around the globe and all of us had a great time. I've also visited interesting places such as the Brooklyn Bridge, One World Observatory and a trip to New York City is incomplete without going to Times Square. I also got to see Wicked and it was my first time watching a live broadway show in New York. I really enjoyed the show and the actors and musical production were terrific.




Palo Alto Networks firewalls implement three primary next-generation features:

App-ID

App-ID is a patented traffic classification technology in Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Firewalls that positively identifies applications traversing your network. Applications can be identified even if traffic is encrypted or if applications are using network ports in a non-standard manner (either for evasion or in an attempt to provide "just works" convenience). This inspection prevents undesired access of "evasive" applications using alternate ports (e.g. TCP port 80).

Identifying each application allows granular Security policies to be written that safely enable just the appropriate application access by authorized users. This feature is a significant improvement over the traditional "port and protocol"-only firewall capability. Application identification is performed through the life of each session on the firewall.

New App-IDs are constantly being created by Palo Alto Networks and updated automatically to firewalls.

App-ID blocking actions can include user notification, eliminating confusion and help desk traffic.

More detail about App-ID can be found on this link.


User-ID

The User Identificatin (User-ID) feature of the Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Firewall enables you to create policies and perform reporting based on users and groups rather than on individual IP addresses. When User-ID is combined with App-ID results, specific users can be granted access to only the applications they need, significantly reducing the organization's attack surface.

More information about User-ID can be found be found on this link.


Content-ID

Content-ID technology delivers a new security approach based onthe complete analysis of all allowed traffic, using multiple advanced threat prevention technologies in a sigle, unified engine.

Content-ID is based on a single-pass architecture, which is a unique combination of software and hardware that was designed from the ground up to integrate multiple threat prevention technologies (IPS, anti-malware, URL filtering, etc.) into a single stream-based approach that simplifies management, streamlining processing, and maximizes performance.

Content-ID is implemented as Security profiles in a firewall's configuration. Separate Security profiles are provided for Antivirus, Anti-Spyware, Vulernable Protection, URL Filtering, File Blocking, WildFire Analysis, and Data Filterig. Each profile provides powerful detection and protection capability. Profiles are applied to Security profiles, creating precise security screening appropriate to the traffic allowed by the policy.

Details about Content-ID can be found on this link.


I took the PAN ACE exam (version 7.0) from the PAN Learning Center (customer login required) after finished reading the PCNSE7 Study Guide, took the Essentials 1 (101) PAN-OS 7.0 online training (customer login required) and doing some labs. The PAN ACE is a free online exam and there's no time limit while taking it. You could even save your exam session and come back anytime. The PAN ACE cert never expires and you'll be lifetime certified for the specific version you took (so I'm PAN ACE 7.0 lifetime certified).

To access the PAN ACE exam click Training Catalog > Accredited Configuration Engineer (ACE) Exam - PAN-OS 7.0 Version.


You could also access online classes, events, curriculum, etc. from the Training Catalog portal.



To take the ACE exam, click Accredited Configuration Engineer (ACE) Exam > click Request > Launch Test.




After completing the ACE exam, you'll receive a congratulatory email after a few minutes and it gives a link on how to download and print your certificate. You could also go to PAN Learning Center under Learning > My Learning.


Under Transcript > click Active > chose Completed > click a specific exam (ACE in this case) > View Certificate (allow pop-up).





Below is how the PAN ACE cert looks like.


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