App-ID identifies applications by their unique properties rather than just ports

The Palo Alto Networks firewall does not classify traffic by port and protocol; instead it identifies the application based on its unique properties and transaction characteristics using the App-ID technology. Some applications, however, require the firewall to dynamically open pinholes to establish the connection, determine the parameters for the session and negotiate the ports that will be used for the transfer of data; these applications use the application-layer payload to communicate the dynamic TCP or UDP ports on which the application opens data connections. For such applications, the firewall serves as an Application Level Gateway (ALG), and it opens a pinhole for a limited time and for exclusively transferring data or control traffic. The firewall also performs a NAT rewrite of the payload when necessary.

The following table lists IPv4, NAT, IPv6, NPTv6 and NAT64 ALGs and indicates with a check mark whether the ALG supports each protocol (such as SIP).