To ensure continuous, secure connectivity and consistent policy enforcement with GlobalProtect in an enterprise environment that uses user- and machine-based certificate authentication, the approach should:
Distribute root and intermediate CAs via Panorama templates: This ensures that all firewalls managed by Panorama share the same trusted certificate authorities for consistency and security.
Use distinct certificate profiles for user vs. machine certificates: This enables separate handling of user and machine authentication, ensuring that both types of certificates are managed and validated appropriately.
Reference an internal OCSP responder: By integrating OCSP checks, the firewall can validate certificate revocation in real-time, meeting the security requirement while minimizing the overhead and latency associated with traditional CRLs (Certificate Revocation Lists).
Automate certificate deployment with Group Policy: This ensures that machine certificates are deployed in a consistent and scalable manner across the enterprise, reducing manual intervention and minimizing user disruption.
This approach supports the requirements for pre-logon, OCSP checks, and minimal user disruption, while maintaining a secure, automated, and consistent authentication process across all firewalls managed via Panorama.

When split tunneling is enabled with the "Both Network Traffic and DNS" option in the GlobalProtect portal configuration, it allows the firewall to control which traffic is sent over the VPN tunnel and which is not. Specifically, it determines which domains are resolved by the VPN-assigned DNS servers (for domains requiring VPN access) and which are resolved by local DNS servers (for domains that can be accessed without the VPN tunnel).

B). Create an authentication sequence that orders the RADIUS profile first followed by the SAML profile, allowing the firewall to attempt RADIUS authentication and fall back to SAML if needed, supporting tandem operation for administrator logins.
C). Create and apply an authentication profile using the SAML Identity Provider Server Profile, which can then be sequenced alongside the existing RADIUS profile without disrupting current authentication.

This approach meets all the requirements for securing east-west traffic within each Kubernetes cluster, maintaining consistent security policies across on-premises and cloud environments, and allowing for dynamic scaling of the CN-Series NGFWs as containerized workloads spin up or down. By using Kubernetes- native deployment tools (such as Helm), the CN-Series NGFWs can be deployed and scaled dynamically within each cluster. Local insertion into the service mesh or CNI ensures that the NGFW can inspect traffic at the appropriate points within the cluster.
Centralized management via Panorama ensures that security policies are uniform across both on-premises and cloud environments, providing visibility and control across all clusters.

SD-WAN interfaces on Palo Alto firewalls are centrally managed through Panorama using the REST API endpoint for "sdwanInterfaceprofiles" in templates, which defines link characteristics before creating the virtual SD-WAN interfaces that group physical Ethernet links.