Palo Alto Networks and Zero Networks Partner to Deliver Unified Zero Trust Security Solution

Vulnerability exploitation has increased dramatically in recent years; data breach notices jumped 312% in 2024 and 90% of organizations are currently exposed to at least one attack path – 80% have paths exposing critical assets. Although most organizations are susceptible to potential breaches, applying advanced security controls to protect critical assets has historically been considered too complex and disruptive. Palo Alto Networks and Zero Networks have teamed up on an integration that changes that, delivering effortless microsegmentation and granular critical asset protection for enhanced network security. 

This strategic integration combines Palo Alto Networks Next-Gen Firewalls (NGFW) with Zero Networks microsegmentation to prevent attacks, stop lateral movement in its tracks, and provide enhanced network security – without adding complexity.  

Simplifying Network Security, Advancing Zero Trust

Nine out of ten security leaders are embracing Zero Trust to improve overall security postures and nearly 70% agree microsegmentation is key to its realization, yet just 5% of organizations are microsegmenting their networks today. What’s driving the disconnect? It often comes down to concerns about implementation complexity.  

"Microsegmentation is a critical component of a zero trust strategy, but historically, complexity has hindered adoption. Security teams need solutions that not only provide strong protections but also simplify implementation. The partnership between Palo Alto Networks and Zero Networks addresses both aspects... Zero Networks’ automation engine streamlines microsegmentation by dynamically discovering assets, intelligently grouping them, and generating precise security policies – while Palo Alto Networks’ NGFWs deliver deep traffic inspection and enforcement. This combination reduces the attack surface, enhances threat prevention, and accelerates time to value." 

- John Grady, Principal Analyst at Enterprise Strategy Group

Layered, Proactive Defense for the Modern Threat Landscape 

By combining automated microsegmentation and NGFWs, organizations can achieve defense-in-depth with improved zero trust implementation, granular policy enforcement, and stronger threat prevention.  

How do microsegmentation and next-generation firewalls work together?

Microsegmentation helps contain threats once they're inside the network by blocking lateral movement; meanwhile NGFWs provide strong perimeter defense and threat prevention, resulting in a layered approach that significantly enhances the overall security posture of the network. The combination provides the gold standard in North-South and East-West traffic protection. 

"Security today isn’t just about keeping threats out – it’s about ensuring they can’t move if they get in. Palo Alto Networks NGFWs provide advanced enforcement both at the perimeter and within the network, while Zero Networks’ automated microsegmentation takes it even further, creating airtight microsegments with least privilege access within the networks. By combining these capabilities, we’re giving security teams a fully integrated, layered defense that proactively reduces risk and stops lateral movement in its tracks – without adding complexity." 

- Amir Frankel, Co-founder and CTO, Zero Networks 

As a result, organizations are empowered with the necessary tools to enforce strict access controls, control lateral movement within their network, and proactively defend critical assets. In today’s threat landscape, where breaches are all but inevitable, this layered approach is vital for achieving cyber resilience.  

“Palo Alto Networks NGFW allows organizations to stay ahead of the most complex threats with ML-powered network security, and microsegmentation is critical to zero trust. Customers tend to adopt either NGFW or a microsegmentation solution, but in today’s complex threat landscape they need both. Our integration with Zero Networks combines our best-in-class NGFW with automated and dynamic microsegmentation, and will be available to all of our NGFW customers to help them enhance their security.” 

- Rich Campagna, SVP Product Management, Palo Alto Networks 

Effortless Microsegmentation, Granular Asset Protection: A Closer Look at the Integration 

Slated to be available to joint customers in Palo Alto Networks Q3 FY25, the integration features benefits like:  

• Enhanced security to stop attacks, prevent lateral spread, and enforce per-asset control with granular precision. 
• Unified hands-off policy management for highly dynamic environments via shared Dynamic Address Groups. 
• Seamless, nondisruptive microsegmentation via agentless deployment for all asset types on-premises and in the cloud. 
• Automated tagging, classification, and secure policy orchestration for smart, scalable protection without manual setup. 

By enabling shared policy constructs across Palo Alto Networks and Zero Networks management consoles, this integration ensures customers can create segmentation and threat prevention policies consistently to safeguard critical assets – all from a single pane of glass. Additionally, it enhances hybrid mesh firewall platforms by seamlessly integrating nondisruptive microsegmentation through agentless deployment for all asset types, whether on-premises or in the cloud. As Palo Alto Networks wrote after being named a Leader in the inaugural 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Hybrid Mesh Firewall: 

Our leadership in Hybrid Mesh Firewall is amplified by a strong ecosystem of trusted partners. For example, through our partnership with Zero Networks, we bring effortless, agentless microsegmentation to our Strata Network Security Platform, enabling organizations to shrink their lateral attack surface and strengthen east-west security, all without the complexity of additional agents or manual policy management.

Unifying these capabilities simplifies security architecture, reduces operational overhead, and delivers comprehensive protection against sophisticated cyber threats.  

About Zero Networks 

Zero Networks is a pioneer in automated microsegmentation and network security. Our agentless microsegmentation solutions provide effortless deployment, automatically learning and classifying endpoints to generate precise security policies that orchestrate native firewalls. By preventing unauthorized lateral movement, enforcing just-in-time multi-factor authentication for privileged access, and enhancing protection for critical assets, we empower organizations across every sector to strengthen their security posture with minimal effort. To learn more about how you can leverage the combined power of Palo Alto Networks and Zero Networks, view the joint solution brief.