System and method for host-initiated firewall discovery in a network environment

At least one non-transitory computer readable medium having instructions stored thereon for discovering a firewall, the instructions when executed by at least one processor cause the processor to:

• intercept, on a source node, a network flow to a destination node having a network address;
• determine a discovery action associated with the network address in a firewall cache;
• send, from the source node, a discovery query to identify a firewall to be used in a route to send the network flow to the destination node, wherein the discovery query is based on the discovery action associated with the network address in the firewall cache;
• receive, at the source node, a discovery result from the firewall, the discovery result including a firewall address and a firewall port of the firewall;
• authenticate the discovery result;
• update the discovery action in the firewall cache with the firewall address and the firewall port when the discovery result is authenticated;
• send metadata associated with the network flow to the firewall;
• and
• release the network flow from the source node.