A device may receive a firewall filter entry that includes one or more match conditions associated with filtering network traffic. The device may identify an access control list (ACL) template associated with the firewall filter entry. The ACL template may be associated with a template type. The device may identify one or more rules, for verifying the firewall filter entry, based on the template type associated with the ACL template. The device may verify the firewall filter entry using the one or more rules. The device may determine a hardware resource, for storing the firewall filter entry, based on the template type and based on verifying the firewall filter entry. The device may store the firewall filter entry using the hardware resource of the device.