BlackBerry SecuSUITE Gets Certified Amidst Balloon-Based Spying Rise

BlackBerry Limited has announced that SecuSUITE for Government 5.0 has been awarded updated National Information Assurance Partnership (NIAP) certifications and listed as a Commercial Solutions for Classified (CSfC) compliant product. This makes it compliant with the highest security requirements for the U.S. Federal Government and the broader Five Eyes intelligence alliance. The updated NIAP certification reinforces BlackBerry’s portfolio of certified security solutions for the government sector. The announcement comes at a time when there are increased national security concerns related to the recent influx of suspected spying operations by Nation-States using fleets of high-altitude surveillance balloons across the globe.

Security vendors are required to seek re-certification of their products every two years, as NIAP is constantly updating the associated protection profiles to address the latest security issues to guard against novel attacks. The renewed NIAP certifications for SecuSUITE should provide peace of mind to those looking for watertight communications security that guards against adversarial surveillance efforts from both traditional ‘bugs’ and brazen spy balloons.

Christoph Erdmann, SVP Secusmart at BlackBerry, said, “From Ukrainian and Russian forces intercepting each other’s phone calls to gain an upper hand in the conflict, to the recent public awareness of State-sponsored, high-altitude monitoring platforms, over the past year there have been no shortage of reminders of the susceptibility of mobile communications to interception.” He further added that “Today, communications – whether phone calls, messages?or file sharing — are being compromised and intercepted at rates never before seen, putting both regular business people and national security-driven missions at extreme risk. It doesn’t have to be this way.”

BlackBerry’s SecuSUITE multi-platform technology protects governments globally against eavesdropping threats to national security communications. In response to the recent spate of high-profile suspected surveillance incidents, the company is rolling out a new version for select enterprise customers designed to protect sensitive business communications of executives. The solution can be easily deployed as a secure app using off-the-shelf iOS, Android, or Windows devices, eliminating the need to carry another device. Using end-to-end encryption, the solution secures one-to-one and group voice calls, messages, file exchange and group chats across international networks. SecuSUITE can also ensure calls from foreign networks to any home country number are protected.

Jack Gold, President of J.Gold Associates, LLC, said, “Most enterprises spend a great deal of effort securing their data, but very few businesses and governments expend any significant effort to protect their staff’s everyday mobile calling and messaging from interception, spoofing and metadata mining. This is a major failing as protecting communications is a critical part of an organization’s overall cybersecurity readiness posture. Solutions like BlackBerry SecuSUITE that provide a proven way to do so for both the public and private sector should be an organizational imperative to guard against things like IP theft or blackmail that is quite often the goal of financially or geo-politically motivated eavesdropping efforts.”

BlackBerry SecuSUITE’s updated NIAP certification and new enterprise offering follows the news of the NATO Communications and Information Agency (NCI Agency) awarding security accreditation to SecuSUITE for Government for global use in official NATO secure communications. BlackBerry continues to enhance its security solutions to ensure its customers remain protected against evolving security threats.