A web application firewall (WAF) is a firewall that protects your web apps by filtering, monitoring, and blocking any malicious HTTP/S traffic travelling to the web application, and prevents any unauthorized data from leaving the app. It does this by adhering to a set of policies that help determine what traffic is malicious and what traffic is safe.

WAFs can be configured into three general models: Whitelisting, Blacklisting, and counting. Whitelisting tells the WAF to only allow traffic that has been pre-approved and meets specified criteria. Blacklisting is configured to block known vulnerabilities and malicious signatures but allows all other traffic. The count is another model, which counts the number of web requests that are matched by the rules inside the Managed Rule. Each of these configurations has pros and cons depending on what your web application is used for. Your internal IT Team or IT partner can set up a configuration that will work best for your specific web applications. Contact us today to see if WAF is the right fit for your organization.