Case Study: United Airlines achieves 40% more threat protection and secures 80,000 employees with Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange

United Airlines Detects and Blocks Evolving Threats with the Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange

United Airlines, the world’s third-largest airline with about 80,000 employees and operations in 48 countries, faced a legacy perimeter-based security architecture that couldn’t keep up with digital transformation or a surge in remote work. Traditional firewalls, VPNs, and point products lacked the agility and advanced threat detection needed, leaving users and data exposed across a broad attack surface.

United adopted the Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange (ZIA, ZPA, ZDX, and DLP), moving to secure direct internet/SaaS access, least‑privileged access for private apps, and real‑time cloud integrations and monitoring. In just six months they inspected 1 PB of TLS traffic, saved over $3M, eliminated six security point products (and firewalls at airports), secured 80,000 users and 2,000+ private apps, and now blocks 40% more threats while unifying and improving their security posture.

United Airlines

Deneen DeFiore

VP & Chief Information Security Officer