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Palo Alto Networks URL Filtering with PAN-DB vs Threat Stack Cloud Security Platform [EOL] comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 16, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Palo Alto Networks URL Filt...
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (9th)
Threat Stack Cloud Security...
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Featured Reviews

Abdul  Basit - PeerSpot reviewer
Deputy Manager IT at Asia Petroleum Limited
Advanced features and robust support elevate overall network management experience
I think URL filtering could be better to some extent. Improvements could be made in Palo Alto Networks URL Filtering with PAN-DB compared to Sophos. The URL filtering option in Palo Alto gives a very clear vision of the network and the applications using URL filtering. If you assign a user in a group not to access certain URLs, that user should only be allowed to access LinkedIn without running videos. However, deep URL filtering in Palo Alto is not configurable. One user can have access to LinkedIn with video running, while another cannot. They should improve this deep analysis of URL filtering options.
SC
Software Development Manager at Rent Dynamics
SecOps program for us, as a smaller company, is amazing; they know what to look for
They could give a few more insights into security groups and recommendations on how to be more effective. That's getting more into the AWS environment, specifically. I'm not sure if that's Threat Stack's plan or not, but I would like them to help us be efficient about how we're setting up security groups. They could recommend separation of VPCs and the like - really dig into our architecture. I haven't seen a whole lot of that and I think that's something that, right off the bat, could have made us smarter. Even as part of the SecOps Program, that could be helpful; a quick analysis. They're analyzing our whole infrastructure and saying, "You have one VPC and that doesn't make a lot of sense, that should be multiple VPCs and here's why." The architecture of the servers in whatever cloud-hosting provider you're on could be helpful. Other than that, they should continue to expand on their notifications and on what's a vulnerability. They do a great job of that and we want them to continue to do that. It would be cool, since the agent is already deployed and they know about the server, they know the IP address, and they know what vulnerability is there, for them to test the vulnerability and see if they can actually exploit it. Or, once we patch it, they could double-check that it can't be. I don't know how hard that would be to build. Thinking on it off the top off my head, it could be a little challenging but it could also be highly interesting. It would also be great if we could test a couple of other features like hammering a server with 100 login attempts and see what happens. Real test scenarios could be really helpful. That is probably more something close to what they do with the SOC 2 audit or the report. But more visualization of that, being able to test things out on our infrastructure to make sure we can or can't hit this box could be interesting.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"It provides visibility and control over where people are web browsing and protects them from going to malicious sites."
"Palo Alto Networks URL Filtering with PAN-DB is easy to use, easy to operate, and easy to edit."
"It's allowed us to have better visibility and protection from threats."
"The tool blocks URLs."
"The Palo Alto solution has improved our organization by providing threat protection across a variety of internet connections. Our company also gets valuable insights regarding threat analysis."
"The URL categories are updated by Palo Alto Networks itself."
"Real-time analysis is excellent, and the integration of the solution with our infrastructure is straightforward and less challenging."
"Prohibited URLs can be listed by category."
"The most valuable feature is the SecOps because they have our back and they help us with the reports... It's like having an extension of your team. And then, it grows with you."
"It has been quite helpful to have the daily alerts coming to my email, as well as the Sev 1 Alerts... We just went through a SOX audit and those were pivotal."
"Every other security tool we've looked is good at containers, or at Kubernetes, is good at AWS, or at instance monitoring. But nobody is good at tying all of those things together, and that's really where Threat Stack shines."
"We like the ability of the host security module to monitor the processes running on our servers to help us monitor activity."
"The number-one feature is the monitoring of interactive sessions on our Linux machines. We run an immutable environment, so that nothing is allowed to be changed in production... We're constantly monitoring to make sure that no one is violating that. Threat Stack is what allows us to do that."
"The rules are really great. They give us more visibility and control over what's being triggered. There's a large set of rules that come out-of-the-box. We can customize them and we can create our own rules based on the traffic patterns that we see."
"There has been a measurable decrease in the meantime to remediation... because we have so many different tech verticals already collated in one place, our ability to respond is drastically different than it used to be."
"It is scalable. It deploys easily with curl and yum."
 

Cons

"The licensing costs and setup costs are very expensive for us. The price is significantly higher compared to other competitive products."
"One way Palo Alto can improve is by offering sandboxing. I don't know if they currently offer a sandboxing feature together with the firewall or not. They should provide secure sandboxing with the firewalls."
"For hosting sites like Blogspot, they host sites that should be in different categories, but get lumped together in general. There needs to be more granularity or multiple categorizations."
"Support needs to be enhanced."
"Customer service is sometimes inconsistent. Some engineers are very knowledgeable, while others cannot answer questions and delay solutions."
"Some software management-wise scalability features need improvement."
"An area for improvement would be the technical support, which can be slow."
"It is an expensive solution and not everyone has the budget for it."
"The compliance and governance need improvement."
"The reports aren't very good. We've automated the report generation via the API and replaced almost all the reports that they generate for us using API calls instead."
"Some features do not work as expected."
"I would like further support of Windows endpoint agents or the introduction of support for Windows endpoint agents."
"It shoots back a lot of alerts."
"They could give a few more insights into security groups and recommendations on how to be more effective. That's getting more into the AWS environment, specifically. I'm not sure if that's Threat Stack's plan or not, but I would like them to help us be efficient about how we're setting up security groups. They could recommend separation of VPCs and the like - really dig into our architecture. I haven't seen a whole lot of that and I think that's something that, right off the bat, could have made us smarter."
"The user interface can be a little bit clunky at times... There's a lot of information that needs to be waded through, and the UI just isn't great."
"The one thing that we know they're working on, but we don't have through the tool, is the application layer. As we move to a serverless environment, with AWS Fargate or direct Lambda, that's where Threat Stack does not have the capacity to provide feed. Those are areas that it's blind to now..."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Expensive, but that's because it provides everything."
"It is more expensive than ASA but is far cheaper than Checkpoint. So, pricing wise, it is right in the middle."
"It is a cost-effective choice versus other solutions on the market."
"I'm happy with the amount that we spend for the product that we get and the overall service that we get. It's not cheap, but I'm still happy with the spend."
"What we're paying now is somewhere around $15 to $20 per agent per month, if I recall correctly. The other cost we have is SecOps."
"It came in cheaper than Trend Micro when we purchased it a few years ago."
"We find the licensing and pricing very easy to understand and a good value for the services provided."
"Pricing seems to be in line with the market structure. It's fine."
"It is very expensive compared to some other products. The pricing is definitely high."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Performing Arts
14%
University
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Performing Arts
16%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Marketing Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise5
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise2
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Palo Alto Networks URL Filtering with PAN-DB?
The licensing costs and setup costs are very expensive for us. The price is significantly higher compared to other competitive products.
What needs improvement with Palo Alto Networks URL Filtering with PAN-DB?
I think URL filtering could be better to some extent. Improvements could be made in Palo Alto Networks URL Filtering with PAN-DB compared to Sophos. The URL filtering option in Palo Alto gives a ve...
What is your primary use case for Palo Alto Networks URL Filtering with PAN-DB?
We previously discussed Palo Alto Networks WildFire, and we are currently using it for our firewalls with the WildFire subscription included. We have micro-segmentation using the VMware environment...
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Also Known As

Palo Alto Networks URL Filtering PAN-DB
Threat Stack, CSP,
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

TRI-AD, Telkom Indonesia
StatusPage.io, Walkbase, Spanning, DNAnexus, Jobcase, Nextcapital, Smartling, Veracode, 6sense
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet, Darktrace, Check Point Software Technologies and others in Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS). Updated: January 2026.
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