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Configure a Vulnerability Protection Profile (PAN-OS & Panorama)
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Configure a Vulnerability Protection Profile (PAN-OS & Panorama)
Stop attempts to exploit system flaws or gain unauthorized access to
systems.
A Security rule can include the specification of a Vulnerability Protection
profile that determines the level of protection against buffer overflows, illegal
code execution, and other attempts to exploit system vulnerabilities. There are two
predefined profiles available for the Vulnerability Protection feature:
- The default profile applies the default action to all client and server critical, high, and medium severity vulnerabilities. It does not detect low and informational vulnerability protection events. The Palo Alto Networks content package on the device determines the default action.
- The strict profile applies the block response to all client and server critical, high, and medium severity spyware events and uses the default action for low and informational vulnerability protection events.
Customized profiles can be used to minimize vulnerability checking for traffic
between trusted security zones, and to maximize protection for traffic received from
untrusted zones, such as the internet, as well as the traffic sent to highly
sensitive destinations, such as server farms.
Apply a Vulnerability Protection profile to every Security rule that
allows traffic to protect against buffer overflows, illegal code execution, and
other attempts to exploit client- and server-side vulnerabilities.
The Rules settings specify collections of signatures to enable, as well as actions to
be taken when a signature within a collection is triggered.
The Exceptions settings allow you to change the response to a specific signature. For
example, you can block all packets that match a signature, except for the selected
one, which generates an alert. The Exception tab supports
filtering functions.
The Vulnerability Protection page presents a default set of
columns. Additional columns of information are available by using the column
chooser. Click the arrow to the right of a column header and select the columns from
the Columns sub-menu.
Follow these steps to configure a Vulnerability Protection profile.
- Go to ObjectsSecurity ProfilesVulnerability Protection.Add a profile.Configure the settings in this table:Vulnerability Protection Profile SettingsDescriptionNameEnter a profile name (up to 31 characters). This name appears in the list of Vulnerability Protection profiles when defining security rules. The name is case-sensitive and must be unique. Use only letters, numbers, spaces, hyphens, periods, and underscores.DescriptionEnter a description for the profile (up to 255 characters).Shared (Panorama only)Select this option if you want the profile to be available to:
- Every virtual system (vsys) on a multi-vsys firewall. If you clear this selection, the profile will be available only to the Virtual System selected in the Objects tab.
- Every device group on Panorama. If you clear this selection, the profile will be available only to the Device Group selected in the Objects tab.
Disable override (Panorama only)Select this option to prevent administrators from overriding the settings of this Vulnerability Protection profile in device groups that inherit the profile. This selection is cleared by default, which means administrators can override the settings for any device group that inherits the profile.Rules TabRule NameSpecify a name to identify the rule.Threat NameSpecify a text string to match. The firewall applies a collection of signatures to the rule by searching signature names for this text string.CVESpecify Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs) if you want to limit the signatures to those that also match the specified CVEs.Each CVE is in the format CVE-yyyy-xxxx, where yyyy is the year and xxxx is the unique identifier. You can perform a string match on this field. For example, to find vulnerabilities for the year 2011, enter “2011”.Host TypeSpecify whether to limit the signatures for the rule to those that are client side, server side, or either (any).SeveritySelect severities to match (informational, low, medium, high, or critical) if you want to limit the signatures to those that also match the specified severities.ActionChoose the action to take when the rule is triggered. For a list of actions, see Security Rule Actions.The Default action is based on the predefined action that is part of each signature provided by Palo Alto Networks. To view the default action for a signature, select ObjectsSecurity ProfilesVulnerability Protection and Add or select an existing profile. Click the Exceptions tab and then click Show all signatures to see a list of all signatures and the associated Action.For the best security, set the Action for both client and server critical, high, and medium severity events to reset-both and use the default action for Informational and Low severity events.Packet CaptureSelect this option if you want to capture identified packets.Select single-packet to capture one packet when a threat is detected, or select the extended-capture option to capture from 1 to 50 packets (default is 5 packets). Extended-capture provides more context to the threat when analyzing the Threat logs. To view the packet capture, select MonitorLogsThreat and locate the log entry you're interested in, and then click the green down arrow in the second column. To define the number of packets that should be captured, select DeviceSetupContent-ID and then edit the Content-ID Settings.If the action for a given threat is allow, the firewall does not trigger a Threat log and does not capture packets. If the action is alert, you can set the packet capture to single-packet or extended-capture. All blocking actions (drop, block, and reset actions) capture a single packet. The content package on the device determines the default action.Enable extended-capture for critical, high, and medium severity events and single-packet capture for low-severity events. Use the default extended-capture value of 5 packets, which provides enough information to analyze the threat in most cases. (Too much packet capture traffic may result in dropping packet captures.) Don’t enable packet capture for informational events because it’s not very useful compared to capturing information about higher severity events and creates a relatively high volume of low-value traffic.Apply extended packet capture using the same logic you use to decide what traffic to log—take extended captures of the traffic you log, including traffic you block.Exceptions TabEnable Select Enable for each threat for which you want to assign an action, or select All to respond to all listed threats. The list depends on the selected host, category, and severity. If the list is empty, there are no threats for the current selections.ID Vendor IDSpecify vendor IDs if you want to limit the signatures to those that also match the specified vendor IDs.For example, the Microsoft vendor IDs are in the form MSyy-xxx, where yy is the two-digit year and xxx is the unique identifier. For example, to match Microsoft for the year 2009, enter “MS09” in the Search field.Threat NameOnly create a threat exception if you're sure an identified threat isn't a threat (false positive). If you believe you have discovered a false positive, open a support case with TAC so Palo Alto Networks can investigate the incorrectly identified threat. When the issue is resolved, remove the exception from the profile immediately.The vulnerability signature database contains signatures that indicate a brute-force attack; for example, Threat ID 40001 triggers on an FTP brute-force attack. Brute-force signatures trigger when a condition occurs in a certain time threshold. The thresholds are pre-configured for brute-force signatures, and can be changed by clicking the edit icon next to the threat name on the Vulnerability tab (with the Custom option selected). You can specify the number of hits per unit of time and whether the threshold applies to source, destination, or source-and-destination.Thresholds can be applied on a source IP, destination IP or a combination of source IP and destination IP.The default action is shown in parentheses.IP Address Exemptions Click into the IP Address Exemptions column to Add IP address filters to a threat exception. When you add an IP address to a threat exception, the threat exception action for that signature will take precedence over the rule's action only if the signature is triggered by a session with either a source or destination IP address matching an IP address in the exception. You can add up to 100 IP addresses per signature. You must enter a unicast IP address (that is, an address without a netmask), such as 10.1.7.8 or 2001:db8:123:1::1. By adding IP address exemptions, you don't have to create a new security rule and new vulnerability profile to create an exception for a specific IP address.Rule CVE The CVE column shows identifiers for Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE). These unique, common identifiers are for publicly known information security vulnerabilities. Host CategorySelect a vulnerability category if you want to limit the signatures to those that match that category.Severity Action Choose an action from the drop-down, or choose from the Action drop-down at the top of the list to apply the same action to all threats.Packet Capture Select Packet Capture if you want to capture identified packets.Show all signatures Enable Show all signatures to list all signatures. If Show all signatures is disabled, only the signatures that are exceptions are listed.Inline Cloud Analysis TabInline Cloud Analysis allows you to enable and configure the settings for real-time analysis of command injection and SQL injection vulnerabilities on a per detection engine basis.Enable cloud inline analysis—Enables inline deep learning detection engines used to detect command injection and SQL injection vulnerabilities across all available inline cloud analysis engines.Available Analysis Engines For each available analysis engine representing a vulnerability category, you can select one of the following actions that you want the firewall to enforce when a corresponding vulnerability is detected:- Allow—The request is allowed and no log entry is generated.
- Alert—The request is allowed and a Threat log entry is generated.
- Reset-Client—Resets the client-side connection.
- Reset-Server—Resets the server-side connection.
- Reset-Both—Resets the connection on both client and server ends.
The default action for all analysis engines is alert.Exclude from Inline Cloud Analysis Allows you to select a URL or IP address exception list that bypasses the inline cloud analysis engines. Exceptions can be specified using URLs and/or IP addresses. URL exceptions include an EDL (external dynamic list) or a custom URL category, while IP address exceptions include an EDL or an Address object. Click Add to view and select from the available options. You can select the following list types:- EDL URL—External Dynamic Lists containing a series of URLs or a custom URL category.
- IP Address—IP address lists defined in an External Dynamic List or within an Address object.Only create IP address and URL exceptions when the identified threats don't pose a danger, such as in the case of a false-positive.
Select OK to save your configuration.