Who provides the security policy for the NGFW when using Cisco ACI?

The security policy for the Next-Generation Firewall (NGFW) when using Cisco ACI is provided by Palo Alto Networks Panorama. Panorama is a centralized management solution that allows for unified policy management and visibility across Palo Alto Networks firewalls. It simplifies the management of security policies, enabling administrators to deploy and enforce security rules consistently across the network.

In the context of Cisco ACI, Panorama integrates with the ACI environment to manage security in a more holistic manner, ensuring that firewall rules and policies align with the overall application and network policies defined within the ACI framework. This integration enhances the ability to enforce security measures effectively across the data center.

The other options, such as the Cisco Application Policy Infrastructure Controller (APIC), actually focus on network policy management rather than specific security policy management for NGFW. APIC primarily manages the application-centric networking elements and policies but does not deliver the firewall-specific security policies, which are the domain of Panorama. Therefore, while APIC plays a significant role in the ACI ecosystem, it does not provide the security policy functionality that Panorama does for NGFW management within this context.