IDT Corporation Regains Visibility and Improves Network Security with PA-4000 Series; Saves Money by Consolidating Legacy Firewalls, Proxies, and IDS

SUNNYVALE, Calif., Nov. 17, 2009 – Palo Alto Networks™, the leader in next-generation firewalls, today announced that IDT Corporation, a Fortune 1000 company operating primarily in the telecommunications and energy industries, has deployed Palo Alto Networks’ PA-4000 Series next-generation firewalls.

IDT Corporation is a consumer services-focused company with operations primarily in the telecommunications and energy industries. Through its Telecom subsidiary, IDT provides retail and wholesale telecommunications services and products, including pre-paid and rechargeable calling cards and wholesale carrier services. Through its Genie Energy subsidiary, IDT operates energy-related businesses including IDT Energy, an Energy Services Company (ESCO) providing electricity and gas to residential and small business customers in New York State, an oil shale joint venture in western Colorado, and an alternative energy initiative in Israel.

"IDT needed a firewall that is reliable, fast and efficient, and would increase visibility on the network with next-generation technology," said Golan Ben-Oni, vice president of Network Architecture at IDT Corporation. "Palo Alto Networks next-generation firewalls meet those requirements, and as an added bonus, enabled us to significantly reduce our network security operations costs."

Palo Alto Networks’ next-generation firewalls are the industry’s most powerful firewall products, enabling enterprises to see and control applications, users and content – not just ports, IP addresses and packets. This is a critical need for enterprises’ management of risk as industry studies continue to show enterprises lack visibility into and control of application traffic due to the outdated functionality of legacy security technology.1 Palo Alto Networks’ next-generation firewalls enable enterprises to create granular, business-relevant security policies and safely control new enterprise and consumer applications as business enablers instead of the block-or-nothing approach offered by traditional port-blocking firewalls.

"IDT Corporation is a leader in consumer telecommunications, and we are pleased to work with them to improve their network security architecture, increase visibility and control, all while consolidating their infrastructure and lowering operating costs," saidLarry Link, vice president of sales, Palo Alto Networks.

"Now, I see what I need from an application and feature set perspective," concluded Ben-Oni. "The PA-4000 Series does everything I need it to do. Palo Alto Networks is dedicated to providing an effective solution for IDT. We have received fantastic support from everyone in the organization – the CEO, CTO, product management, engineering and technical support."

About Palo Alto Networks

Palo Alto Networks™ is the leader in next-generation firewalls, enabling unprecedented visibility and granular policy control of applications and content – by user, not just IP address – at up to 10Gbps with no performance degradation. Based on patent-pending App-ID™ technology, Palo Alto Networks firewalls accurately identify and control applications – regardless of port, protocol, evasive tactic or SSL encryption – and scan content to stop threats and prevent data leakage. Enterprises can for the first time embrace Web 2.0 and maintain complete visibility and control, while significantly reducing total cost of ownership through device consolidation. For more information, visit www.paloaltonetworks.com.

Note 1 – “Application Usage and Risk Report,” Palo Alto Networks, November 9, 2009.

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