Founder Profile
Nir Zuk
Last reviewed: October 2026 · By Swet Parvadiya
Who is Nir Zuk?
Nir Zuk is a founder of Palo Alto Networks, Inc., which was founded in 2005.
- Company founded
- Palo Alto Networks, Inc.
- Founded
- 2005
Background
Nir Zuk served in the Israel Defense Forces' Unit 8200, then worked as an engineer at Check Point Software and later at OneSecure and NetScreen Technologies, which Juniper Networks acquired in 2004.
Founding Story
Nir Zuk is the Israeli-American engineer who founded Palo Alto Networks in 2005 and has served as its chief technology officer. After years building stateful firewalls and intrusion prevention systems at Check Point and NetScreen, he concluded that port-based firewalls could not see modern application traffic. He designed Palo Alto's single-pass architecture, which classifies traffic by application, user and content, and which became known as the next-generation firewall. Nir Zuk was born in 1971.
Sources
This profile does not yet cite a source specific to Nir Zuk. The sources below document the company company rather than the person, so check them against the claims above.
- Palo Alto Networks FY2026 Q4 earnings release (Palo Alto Networks, Inc.)
- Palo Alto Networks FY2026 Q3 earnings release (Palo Alto Networks, Inc.)