Opengear Takes Security, Compliance To ‘Next Level’ For Partners Via SOC 2, ISO Certs

‘From a vendor perspective, for us to be able to showcase these documentations, [it] takes that relationship and trust to the next level for our partners,’ Ramtin Rampour, principal solutions architect for Opengear, tells CRN.

Opengear, a provider of network monitoring, data center and IT infrastructure management, wants to do the “heavy lifting” in security for partners, the company told CRN.

Opengear, a Digi International company, on Wednesday revealed that it has achieved SOC 2 Type 2 and ISO 27001 compliance. For partners, the new security certifications represent Opengear’s ongoing investment in security governance, continuous monitoring, and willingness to improve to meet rapidly changing customer and regulatory requirements, Ramtin Rampour, principal solutions architect for Opengear, told CRN.

“Partners can be even more comfortable when they’re talking to their customers because there is a difference between when we say we do something and when we can show it with documentation,” he said. “From a from a vendor perspective, for us to be able to showcase these documentations, [it] takes that relationship and trust to the next level for our partners.”

The new certifications demonstrate that Opengear now meets independently verified global standards for security, availability, and confidentiality. It proves that enterprises, partners and service providers can rely on the company to maintain network access during outages, the company said.

The process to gain SOC 2 Type 2 and ISO 27001 compliance involved documenting all security practices. Opengear manufactures its own hardware, software and firmware, which means the company is able to keep a fairly tight perimeter around security, but the certifications also required Opengear to validate all third-party vendors it works with, said Rampour.

“The entire organization has to be involved, because security is around the entire border of the company, not just one portion or one small group inside the company,” he said.

The elevated level of compliance also positions channel-friendly Opengear among a select group of providers with this level of certification and further separates the company from its competitors, Rampour said.

“We’ve been working on this for a while, and my biggest excitement factor is that a lot of this was already done, it was just a matter of documenting the fact that we’re doing all these security practices and partnering with our third-party vendors to make sure that we get their best security practices, or requiring them, at times, to add certain levels of documentation to their company,” he said. “Some have actually gone through and have gotten certifications themselves just to be able to continue working with us. That really says a lot about how important security is for us and for all the vendors and partners that we work with.”

Sandy, Utah-based Opengear was acquired by IoT giant Digi International in 2019. With any acquisition comes security concerns for end customers and channel partners. Another important byproduct of the new certifications is that it plays into Digi International’s broader security strategy and emphasis on network resilience, the company said.

“Customers have concerns about transitions [and] about security, but we can attest that not only we were a secure company, now as a part of Digi, we have obtained our own individual SOC 2 and ISO certificate, which puts us ahead in terms of security,” said Rampour (pictured above). “It is critical for us to be at the top level in terms of IT and technology standards.”