Product Announcements

We are happy to update on the availability of R80.20 Security Gateways (based on new Linux kernel) and R80.20 Security Management in GCP.

Both BYOL & PAYG solutions are updated with the new version and ready for deployment through the GCP marketplace:

https://console.cloud.google.com/marketplace/browse?q=cloudguard

As always we are here for your comments and suggestions,

CloudGuard IaaS R&D 

Hi,

We’ve announced in CPX Asia 2 new Security Gateways appliances: 6500 & 6800. The Check Point 6500 and 6800 are a new generation of high performance Security Gateways for the enterprise market segment. With the new 6000 series, enterprise customers can enable advanced threat prevention and inspect for threats within TLS encrypted traffic.

The 6500 and 6800 will be available in the Check Point Product Catalog from February 1^st.

Datasheets are available for download now.

• 6500 Security Gateway Datasheet 
• 6800 Security Gateway Datasheet  

Support Links

• 6000 Support - Solutions, Documentation, Downloads, Security Alerts 
• Check Point 6000 Appliances Getting Started Guide 

With the introduction of the 6500 & 6800 we are taking the opportunity to simplify and accelerate our business processes.

These new products and all of their accessories are priced with significant discounts incorporated in their list prices. This shortens sales cycles and eliminates dependencies in discounting processes.

In addition we revisited how we offer our Security Gateways. Instead of dozens of tedious appliance SKUs, each model will be available in 2 simple configurations: base and PLUS. Both are equipped with our existing and well-known Next Generation Threat Prevention subscription for the first year. The PLUS option adds a richer hardware configuration; redundant components when supported by the gateway, SSDs and extra memory for additional connection capacity. The base option comes with Hard Disk Drive(s) and supports local management while the PLUS with SSD disk(s) does not.

With the ~50% price reduction in accessories there are also stricter discounting policies which are also incorporated into the Check Point Product Catalog.

I would like to take this opportunity and thank the many groups that were involved in the introduction of these 2 new appliances – R&D, QA, Finance, NPI, Product Infrastructure, Planning, Business Analysis, Legal – great Teamwork!

Feel free to contact me in any question or query regarding the 6500 & 6800.

Wishing you a successful and fruitful 2019.

regards,
Yaron Weiler
Security Gateways Product Manager
yaronw@checkpoint.com
+972-54-9222361

Remember the teasers about new Gaia features in EA (REST API and Dynamic CLI) ?

So, we are glad to let you know that both features are now available for download, and have public SKs with all relevant information :

Ender (REST API) - sk143612

Dynamic CLI - sk144112

Please, feel free to try them out, and let us know what you think.

You can use GAIA_TECH@MICHAEL.CHECKPOINT.COM  forum to ask questions and share your experience, so that more people will get the sense of those features.

We will be showing both features in upcoming CPX, with live demo in Tech Room. Let me know if you want to meet there and discuss specific use-cases or roadmap.

I've been asked several times about if CloudGuard is a WAF product (that's another discussion!) and how best can a dedicated WAF service be placed in front of CloudGuard IaaS gateways. As all the requests came from customers using Microsoft Azure, I decided to look into the Application Gateway.

In short, the Application Gateway is basically a "load balancer on steroids" and provides much the same functionality as a standard SKU Azure Load Balancer, but with the added benefit of WAF capabilities. As our reference architecture in Azure uses a load balancer and one or more gateways, this seemed the obvious choice for the deployment.

I wrote a lab guide to deploying this solution, as with most cloud topics, it will age very quickly, but hopefully give you a good starting point if you have a project that has strict requirements on having a WAF service at the Azure perimeter. It's very much a first draft, so there will be mistakes and also outdated information, please provide any feedback below.

Note this is not official Check Point documentation or advice, deploy this solution at your own risk. No warranties implied, may contain nuts. Check Point are not responsible for any service charges accrued by this deployment. The value of investments may go down as well as up.

Hi Everyone,

We are glad to announce that R80.20 Gateway with new Linux kernel is now generally available in Azure & AWS.

The new image offers significant improvements:

• Significant improvement in performance throughout – See detailed table below
• Upgraded Linux kernel (based on RHEL 7.x kernel 3.10)
• Added support for Azure Accelerated Networking
• Added support for AWS next generation EC2 Compute Optimized instances family – C5
• For the entire list of R80.20 security features, see SK122485
• See sk141173 - Check Point R80.20 with Gaia 3.10 for Security Gateways for more information on GAIA OS & Limitations

Important

• R77.30 based solutions will be removed soon from the marketplace.
• For specific exceptional cases where R77.30 is needed, please contact Check Point TAC.
• Only standard deployment is supported for single R80.20 gateway. Standalone and custom configuration modes are not supported.
• In order to manage R80.20 gateways using R80.10 Management Server JHF take 177 or later must be installed.
  See sk116380 for more information.

Performance

AWS

For R80.20 gateway:

• Tested with Cloud-Certified leading testing equipment
• Used AWS on-demand instances environment
• Actual performance results may vary depending on cloud infrastructure resources availability, region, topology, and other factors
• These results are based on actual performances measurements by Check Point performance lab using real-world traffic simulation with out-of-the-box configuration

Azure

For R80.20 gateways:

• Tested using default deployment and Check Point configurations.
• Tested with Cloud-Certified leading testing equipment

• Actual performance results may vary depending on cloud infrastructure resources availability, region, topology, and other factors
• These results are based on actual performances measurements by Check Point performance lab using real-world traffic simulation with out-of-the-box configuration

Notes:

-          For different VM sizes see: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/virtual-machines-linux-sizes/ 

-          Performance can be limited by the network bandwidth allocated by Azure to the VM

-          NGFW:  FW + IPS (Recommended - out of the box) + APCL

-          NGTP: NGTP : FW + IPS (Recommended - out of the box) + APCL + URLF + AV + AB

AWS Solution templates update

All deployment options (Single Gateway, Cluster, Auto Scaling Group and Transit VPC) are supported and can be deployed using our CloudFormation templates.

Azure Solution templates update

The following marketplace offers have been renamed:

• Check Point CloudGuard IaaS R80.10 Scale Set à Check Point CloudGuard IaaS Scale Set (as it supports both R80.10 & R80.20).
• Check Point CloudGuard IaaS R80.10 High Availability à Check Point CloudGuard IaaS High Availability (as it supports both R80.10 & R80.20).
• Check Point CloudGuard IaaS Cluster à Check Point CloudGuard IaaS R77.30 & R80.10 Cluster (as it supports only R77.30 & R80.10).

The new image is supported by the following solutions:

• Check Point CloudGuard IaaS Single Gateway
• Check Point CloudGuard IaaS High Availability
• Check Point CloudGuard IaaS Scale Set

This version will be available on OCI & GCP Marketplace, soon.

As always we are here for your comments and suggestions.

CloudGuard IaaS R&D