Cato Networks - Detailed Review

Cato Networks Overview

Cato Networks offers a comprehensive suite of networking and security tools integrated into their SASE (Secure Access Service Edge) Cloud Platform, which heavily leverages AI and machine learning (ML) to enhance its functionality. Here are the key features and how they work:

Single Pass Cloud Engine (SPACE)

The core of Cato’s platform is the Single Pass Cloud Engine (SPACE), which converges multiple network security functions such as NGFW, SWG, IPS, CASB, DLP, and ZTNA into a cloud-native software stack. SPACE ensures consistent enforcement of security policies for both inline traffic and out-of-band access, providing real-time traffic visibility and capturing rich context and event data for incident detection and response.

AI and ML Integration

Cato extensively uses AI and ML to simplify security operations. Here are some key AI-driven features:

Generative AI for Threat Summarization

Cato uses generative AI to summarize security indicators into a one-paragraph summary, making it easier for security teams to communicate threats to other IT members.

Threat Identification and Ranking

AI and ML algorithms identify and rank threats by finding similarities between new security incidents and past incidents within a customer’s account or across all Cato accounts. This speeds up threat identification and reduces false positives.

Real-Time Machine Learning-Powered Protection

Cato implements real-time ML-powered protection for malicious domain identification, enhancing the platform’s ability to detect and prevent threats in real-time.

Self-Healing, Self-Optimizing, and Self-Scaling

Cato’s platform includes several self-managing features:

Self-Healing

In case of a failure, Cato migrates affected edges to an alternate component to ensure service continuity.

Self-Optimizing

The platform monitors the availability and performance of each path to determine the fastest route between any source and destination.

Self-Scaling

Cato distributes traffic across multiple SPACEs and can scale with more compute nodes or new Points of Presence (PoPs) as needed.

Network Modernization and Optimization

Cato helps customers transition from traditional MPLS to SD-WAN, offering:

MPLS Migration to SD-WAN

Cato Edge SD-WAN and multiple Internet links improve capacity and resiliency at a lower cost per Mbps. The global private backbone replaces global MPLS services, reducing costs and improving performance.

Optimal Global Application Access

Cato’s global private backbone with traffic acceleration and optimization ensures SLA-backed, predictable, and high-performance application access. The ‘smart egress’ feature optimizes SaaS application access by exiting traffic at a designated PoP closest to the target instance.

Secure Remote Access

Cato provides optimized and secure remote access through:

Cato Client and Clientless Browser Access

Remote users can access all business applications via a secure and optimized connection. Cato’s global private backbone and WAN optimization eliminate performance challenges associated with legacy VPNs.

Endpoint Protection

The Cato Client includes endpoint protection capabilities with a next-generation anti-malware engine to prevent malware infection and share endpoint anomalous behavior data for incident detection and response.

Extended Detection and Response (XDR)

Cato’s XDR capability combines network detection and response (NDR) and endpoint detection and response (EDR) across a granular and context-rich data lake. AI/ML-driven threat hunting, AI-assisted analyst workbench, and incident response playbooks enhance the ability to detect and respond to threats. This feature is extensively tested by Cato’s managed detection and response (MDR) analysts.

Network Incident Detection and Response

Cato’s Network Stories for Cato XDR use advanced AI algorithms to identify outages in customer networks and conduct root cause analysis. This reduces outage times from hours to minutes and provides NOC and SOC teams with a common platform for improved collaboration. Generative AI summarizes network incidents into human-readable explanations, and Cato Playbooks guide remediation efforts. These features collectively make Cato’s SASE Cloud Platform a powerful tool for consolidating networking and security capabilities, enhancing security operations, and optimizing network performance.