Cortex Cloud
Palo Alto Networks' cloud security platform, introduced in 2025 as the successor to Prisma Cloud and merging its CNAPP capabilities with Cortex detection and response on one data foundation. Both names remain in use during the multi-year customer migration, with Cortex Cloud as the go-forward brand.
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- Product type
- Software
- Deployment
- SaaSAgent
- Organization size
- Mid-marketEnterprise
- Pricing tier
- $$$
How Cortex Cloud measures up against the full Cloud-Native Application Protection / Posture Management taxonomy.
- Misconfiguration detection (CSPM) — supported
- Flags cloud configuration drift against benchmarks like CIS and provider best practices.
- Agentless workload scanning — supported
- Scans workloads via cloud provider APIs or snapshots without deploying agents.
- Cloud entitlement management (CIEM) — supported
- Identifies excessive or unused permissions across cloud identities.
- Attack path analysis — supported
- Correlates findings across identity, network, and data exposure to surface exploitable attack paths.
- Infrastructure-as-code scanning — supported
- Catches misconfigurations in Terraform and CloudFormation before they're deployed.
- Vulnerability prioritization — supported
- Finds and ranks OS and package CVEs across cloud workloads by real-world exploitability.
- Compliance benchmark mapping — supported
- Continuously maps posture to frameworks like CIS, SOC 2, and PCI.
Alternatives
Other Cloud-Native Application Protection / Posture Management tools with overlapping capabilities, sized for similar teams.