Fortinet Firewall Automated Best Practice Compliance Testing
Overview
Cyfora is a cybersecurity platform company specializing in security compliance testing and automated vulnerability assessment. During my internship from February 23 to May 29, 2025, I worked on a critical project to develop an automated framework for Fortinet firewall configuration compliance testing. My role involved designing and implementing a comprehensive solution that validates firewall configurations against industry best practices.
In the initial phase of my internship, I contributed to Cyfora's existing Palo Alto firewall analyzer, where I implemented various Best Practice compliance checks. This work was invaluable as it provided deep insight into the working and architecture of Cyfora's analysis platform, data flow mechanisms. This knowledge helped significantly when transitioning to the Fortinet project.
The primary focus of my internship was designing and implementing the Fortinet Firewall technology, which addresses a need that customers want in the platform: Fortinet firewalls contain hundreds of configuration parameters that are impractical to manually verify for compliance. I engineered a solution that reads Fortinet YAML configurations or uses API calls, validates them against 41 security best practices (administrative policies, firewall policies, and more), and generates an interactive compliance report. The Fortinet framework follows Cyfora's data architecture and patterns so it seamlessly integrates with the existing platform.
The framework has been completed and delivered as a solution ready for integration. It has been added to Cyfora's platform implementation list, where it will enable their clients to automatically validate firewall configurations for security compliance. Once fully integrated, this solution will significantly reduce the time and error rate associated with manual compliance verification, providing value for Cyfora's customers.
Evidence & Deliverables
The following documents and files have been reviewed and verified by my internship supervisor:
📑 Project Plan
View the project plan outlining the scope, timeline and deliverables for the Fortinet framework.
🪞 Internship Reflection
My personal reflection on the internship experience, what I gained, and how it shaped my professional development.
Html Report
View the interactive HTML report detailing the Fortinet firewall implementation.
Internship Logbook
View the detailed logbook documenting my daily activities and learnings during the internship.
Key Learnings & Skills Developed
During my internship, I developed concrete technical and professional capabilities through hands-on work with compliance frameworks and platform architecture:
Understanding & Extending Infrastructure
I began by thoroughly analyzing Cyfora's existing Palo Alto analyzer to understand the platform's data flow and architecture. This foundation enabled me to design the Fortinet framework following the same patterns, ensuring seamless integration rather than creating isolated solutions. This experience reinforced that extending enterprise systems requires first understanding how they already work.
Multi-Source Data Parsing
Developed proficiency in extracting configuration data from multiple sources: both Fortinet YAML configuration files and live API calls. This required understanding different data formats and handling the complexities of real-world firewall configurations. The skill directly supports the framework's flexibility in supporting different deployment scenarios and data collection methods.
Compliance Automation Engineering
Translated 41 security best practices into automatable compliance checks that can validate Fortinet configurations at scale. This required understanding security knowledge and combining it with technical implementation (how to test configurations programmatically). The framework demonstrates how compliance validation transforms from a manual time-consuming process into a automated solution.
About the Company
Cyfora is a European cybersecurity and compliance technology company headquartered in Lochristi, Belgium. The platform specializes in continuous cyber assurance, helping organizations validate their security controls and configurations in real-time against industry frameworks and best practices. Built by a European team for European compliance requirements, Cyfora integrates with existing security stacks (Palo Alto, SentinelOne, Microsoft 365, Fortinet, and others) and maps to regulatory frameworks including NIS2, ISO 27001, and CIS Controls v8.
The platform's core value proposition is transforming manual, time-consuming compliance and security validation work into automated, continuous oversight. Rather than relying on periodic audits and manual policy reviews, Cyfora provides organizations with a live dashboard of their cybersecurity posture, policy coverage, and compliance status—enabling faster identification of configuration gaps and misalignments between policy and implementation. This is particularly relevant in the current regulatory environment where compliance requirements are accelerating (NIS2, DORA, ISO 27001 revisions) and organizations need both tighter controls and continuous evidence collection.