NordLayer cloud Firewall solutions

Firewalls fall into 3 broad categories. Hardware firewalls are physical appliances that sit at the edge of your network and filter traffic for everyone behind them. Software firewalls run on individual devices and protect that single machine wherever it connects. The third type is a firewall in the cloud, delivered as a service and hosted by a provider, which protects cloud resources, applications, and distributed teams without any equipment on site. Plenty of organizations still combine all 3, though cloud firewalls have become the natural fit for teams whose people and data no longer sit in one building.

No, because a firewall on cloud infrastructure and a VPN solve different problems and are strongest when used side by side. A VPN encrypts the connection between a user’s device and your network, so data stays private as it travels, even over untrusted networks. A firewall decides which traffic is allowed through in the first place, filtering connections against the rules you set. One protects the path, the other controls who can use it. NordLayer brings both into a single platform, giving your team encrypted connections along with precise control over the resources they can reach.

Not automatically. Cloud providers secure the infrastructure their services run on, but protecting your own data, applications, and users inside that environment stays your responsibility under the shared responsibility model. That’s the gap firewall-as-a-service (FWaaS) solutions are designed to close, delivering full firewall protection as a cloud service rather than a box on your premises. You get control over inbound and outbound traffic, consistent policy enforcement across every cloud resource you use, and the same standard of protection you’d expect from a traditional network firewall, with none of the hardware to look after.

A cloud firewall solution guards against the threats that target your network, your users, and your data. It blocks unauthorized access by filtering every connection against your rules, so only approved users, devices, and destinations get through. It flags and stops suspicious activity, such as outbound traffic heading to unknown or malicious destinations, which is often the first sign of a breach in progress. It also keeps users away from harmful sites and risky downloads. All of this applies to cloud and on-premises resources alike, so your whole environment is covered from one place.

NordLayer’s cloud-managed firewall protects everything your business runs on, including SaaS applications, IaaS and PaaS workloads, on-premises resources, and remote devices, across as many cloud providers as you use. Whether your setup sits in one cloud, several, or a mix of cloud and on-site infrastructure, the same rules apply consistently everywhere. Protection is delivered through the NordLayer desktop and mobile apps on Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, and iOS, so your team simply needs to be connected through the app. The browser extension doesn’t carry cloud firewall coverage, so the app is the one to use.

NordLayer’s FWaaS solutions let you build up to 110 rules in total, with a maximum of 100 active at any one time. Each rule either allows or denies traffic to the destinations you specify, and rules are read from the top of the list downwards, with the first match deciding what happens. That makes ordering important, so your most specific rules belong near the top, and your broader ones further down. You can add around 20 destinations to a single rule, which is a useful way to group similar services and keep your list short and easy to follow.

Anything that doesn’t match a rule falls through to the default action, which you choose yourself. Set it to “Allow” and unmatched traffic passes freely, so your rules act as a list of exceptions to block. Set it to “Deny” and anything you haven’t explicitly permitted is blocked, giving you a stricter allowlist approach where only approved traffic gets through. It’s worth deciding this deliberately, since it shapes how the rest of your rules behave. You can change the default action whenever you need to from the Control Panel, so it’s easy to tighten things up as you go.