URL Filtering

Palo Alto Networks URL filtering solution, Advanced URL Filtering, gives you a way to control not only web access, but how users interact with online content. PAN-DB—the Advanced URL Filtering cloud— classifies sites based on content, features, and safety, and you can enforce your security policy based on these URL categories. You can also prevent credential phishing theft by tightly controlling the types of sites to which users can enter their corporate credentials.

Visit Test A Site to see how PAN-DB categorizes a URL, and to learn about all available URL categories.

Review the Advanced URL Filtering datasheet for a high-level summary of how Advanced URL Filtering enables safe web access; protect your users from dangerous websites, malware sites, credential-phishing pages and attacks attempting to leverage web browsing to deliver threats.

Latest Features

Date	Highlights
28 February 2022	Firewalls with an Advanced URL Filtering license now include access to a new cloud-based, inline deep learning engine that analyzes suspicious web page content to protect users against zero-day web attacks. Advanced URL Filtering is capable of detecting and preventing advanced and targeted phishing attacks, and other web-based attacks that use advanced evasion techniques
01 November 2021	As of 11/3/2021, the URL Filtering subscription service is no longer available for purchase - this includes both renewals and net new customers. Existing users may continue to use the URL Filtering subscription until the conclusion of their service term. All features included with the legacy URL filtering subscription are included with the Advanced URL Filtering subscription.
31 July 2021	As of 7/31/2021, BrightCloud® support has been removed from all versions of PAN-OS. PAN-DB, the Palo Alto Networks-developed URL filtering database, is now the exclusive URL classification provider for URL filtering and Advanced URL filtering subscription services.
22 July 2021	The Advanced URL Filtering security subscription provides a new, cloud-based ML-powered web security engine that protects you against advanced web-based attacks by performing web traffic inspection in real-time. Prevent known and unknown advanced, file-less web-based attacks including targeted phishing, web-delivered malware and exploits, command-and-control, social engineering, and other types of web attacks. Now available as an optional security subscription with PAN-OS 9.0 and later.
15 July 2020	With URL Filtering inline ML, you can now prevent JavaScript exploits and phishing attacks found in webpages from entering your network in real-time with the power of machine learning. Now available with PAN-OS 10.0!
12 February 2021	New security-focused URL categories allow you to write simple security policy based on website safety. The new categories—like high-risk, medium-risk, and newly-registered domains—identify sites that are likely to expose you to web-based threats. Now available with PAN-OS 9.0!
12 February 2019	Multi-category URL Filtering moves you beyond a "block-and-allow" approach to controlling web access, and instead control how users interact with online content. Now available with PAN-OS 9.0!
03 December 2020	Firewalls with URL Filtering running any PAN-OS version can leverage the latest PAN-DB analysis features: Real Time Updates: When a user first attempts to access an unknown site, PAN-DB can now categorize the site in real-time. A firewall running any PAN-OS version with URL Filtering can enforce subsequent attempts to access the site based on it's URL category, instead of treating it as unknown. Machine Learning for Images: Phishing: PAN-DB uses AI-based image recognition to compare what a site looks like to the human eye, against the site's source code. Within seconds, PAN-DB can identify sophisticated phishing sites that might evade standard detections and are convincingly designed to imitate real, trusted sites—like a corporate or bank login page.