What is Azure Firewall?
Azure Firewall is a fully managed cloud-native firewall service with built-in high availability and unlimited scalability. The firewall provides stateful packet inspection, application-level filtering, and integrated threat intelligence from Microsoft.
Unlike Network Security Groups, Azure Firewall operates at Layer 3 through Layer 7 and can apply complex filtering rules based on FQDNs, URLs, and protocols.
Core Features
- Stateful firewall with full L3-L7 filtering
- FQDN-based rules for outbound traffic
- Threat intelligence feed from Microsoft Security
- NAT rules for inbound connections
- Centralized management via Azure Firewall Manager
- TLS inspection for encrypted traffic
Typical Use Cases
Hub-spoke network topology: Central firewall in the hub VNet that controls all traffic between spoke VNets and the internet.
Outbound traffic control: Restricting outbound traffic to allowed FQDNs to prevent data exfiltration and command-and-control connections.
Hybrid networking: Securing traffic between Azure and on-premises via ExpressRoute or VPN, with unified rules for both environments.
Benefits
- No capacity planning required through automatic scaling
- Integrated threat detection without additional tools
- Centralized policy management for multiple firewalls
- Native integration with Azure Monitor and Sentinel
Frequently Asked Questions
What does Azure Firewall cost?
Azure Firewall Standard costs approximately $1.25/hour for deployment plus approximately $0.016/GB of processed data. The Premium tier with TLS inspection costs approximately $1.75/hour.
What is the difference between Standard and Premium?
Azure Firewall Premium additionally offers TLS inspection, IDPS (Intrusion Detection and Prevention), URL filtering, and web categories. For workloads with compliance requirements, Premium is recommended.
Can Azure Firewall defend against DDoS attacks?
Azure Firewall provides basic protection. For comprehensive DDoS protection, Azure DDoS Protection Standard should be enabled, which works together with Azure Firewall.
How do I configure rules for multiple firewalls?
Azure Firewall Manager enables centralized management of policies across multiple firewalls and regions. Policies can be structured hierarchically.
Integration with innFactory
As a Microsoft Solutions Partner, innFactory supports you with Azure Firewall: network architecture, rule design, threat intelligence, and cost optimization.
