F5 has introduced significant updates to its Application Delivery and Security Platform (ADSP), focusing on enhancing API discovery, improving threat detection, and optimizing network connectivity. The latest enhancements are part of the 7.0 release of the F5 Distributed Cloud Services, representing a crucial upgrade that aims to provide organizations with greater visibility and control over API protection.
Kunal Anand, Chief Product Officer at F5, emphasized the importance of APIs in today’s digital landscape. “APIs are everywhere, powering every connection across apps, users, and data,” he stated. The new capabilities enable enterprises to achieve unified visibility and control over APIs, whether they are supported by F5 BIG-IP, F5 NGINX, or within air-gapped environments. Anand added, “We’re collapsing complexity, giving teams instant control over bot defense, cloud-native operations, and network connectivity, all in one platform.”
Expanded API Discovery and Threat Detection
The enhancements to the F5 ADSP include expanded API discovery features that allow customers to visualize hidden endpoints, sensitive data flows, and inconsistent controls across various environments, including BIG-IP, NGINX, and other proxies. These capabilities can be implemented without the need to rearchitect applications or alter traffic paths. The API discovery for BIG-IP enables out-of-band visibility across BIG-IP TMOS systems (versions 15.1 and above).
Additionally, API discovery for NGINX and other proxies, such as NGINX Plus, Kong, and Apigee, is currently available in early access. This feature allows customers to unify inventory and analysis across diverse environments. For those in regulated industries or with stringent data sovereignty requirements, local API discovery can also be deployed as an air-gapped option, ensuring visibility without sending data to the cloud.
The release also broadens the scope of API testing to address vulnerabilities outlined in the OWASP API Top 10. It introduces new detection capabilities across several critical threat categories, including Broken Object Level Authorization (BOLA) and Broken Authentication. These advancements enable organizations to identify threats more accurately and maintain a robust security posture in complex API ecosystems.
Enhanced Bot Defense and Operational Improvements
The updates to F5’s Bot Defense capabilities feature tighter integration with F5’s managed offerings. This integration streamlines the onboarding process for applications and services requiring bot protection by simplifying configurations and reducing the need for extensive expertise. With the new native console routing, organizations can quickly apply security policies where necessary, allowing for tailored bot defense strategies that respond to evolving automated threats.
F5 has also implemented advanced filtering rules using regex operators, along with new options such as ‘contains’ and ‘not contains,’ to enhance threat analysis and improve resolution speed.
Operational improvements include a modernized service discovery framework for Kubernetes and Consul environments. This upgrade allows organizations to efficiently map discovered services to individual tenants while applying robust role-based access control (RBAC). These enhancements are vital for enterprises looking to scale their cloud-native workloads confidently.
Furthermore, the F5 Distributed Cloud Network Connect has introduced expanded routing intelligence and seamless integration with external connectors and BGP routing policies. This feature facilitates the automatic creation of secure tunnels to SD-WAN routers and third-party networking devices. With granular control over traffic flows, enterprises benefit from advanced customization options that enhance operational assurance.
The comprehensive updates to the F5 Application Delivery and Security Platform reflect the company’s commitment to providing businesses with the tools necessary to navigate the complexities of modern digital environments while ensuring robust protection for their APIs and applications.
