Security and Privacy at Bound

Bound is dedicated to maintaining a secure and transparent environment where all information is safeguarded, upholding the trust placed in us by students, parents, and educational institutions.

| Governance

Bound's Security and Privacy team establishes policies and controls, monitors compliance with those controls, and proves our security and compliance to third-party auditors.

01.

Access should be restricted to individuals with a legitimate business necessity, following the principle of least privilege to minimize risk.

02.

Security controls should be layered strategically, adhering to the defense-in-depth approach to ensure multiple levels of protection.

03.

Security measures must be uniformly enforced across the entire organization to maintain consistency and reduce vulnerabilities.

04.

The deployment of security controls should be an iterative process, continuously evolving to enhance effectiveness, auditability, and operational efficiency while minimizing friction.

Security and Compliance at Bound

Bound is actively engaged with an auditor for an SOC 2 Type II audit to verify our approach and commitment to security and compliance. Bound also maintains PCI compliance through the PCI-SAQ process.

Data Protection

5-3 Data At Rest

All datastores with customer data, in addition to S3 buckets, are encrypted at rest. This means the data is encrypted even before it hits the database so that neither physical access, nor logical access to the database, is enough to read the most sensitive information.

 

7 Data In Transit

Bound uses TLS 1.2 or higher everywhere data is transmitted over potentially insecure networks. We also use features such as HSTS (HTTP Strict Transport Security) to maximize the security of our data in transit. Server TLS keys and certificates are managed by AWS and deployed via Application Load Balancers.

 

4-Mar-07-2025-09-57-07-6161-PM Secret Management

Encryption keys are managed via AWS Key Management System (KMS). KMS stores key material in Hardware Security Modules (HSMs), which prevents direct access by any individuals, including employees of Amazon and Bound. The keys stored in HSMs are used for encryption and decryption via Amazon’s KMS APIs.


Application secrets are encrypted and stored securely via AWS Secrets Manager and Parameter Store, and access to these values is strictly limited.

| Enterprise Security

3-Mar-07-2025-10-04-19-5242-PM Security Education

Bound provides comprehensive security training to all employees upon onboarding and annually through educational modules within the our compliance software platform. Additionally, Bound’s security team shares threat briefings with employees to inform them of important security and safety-related updates that require special attention or action. 

 

2-Mar-07-2025-10-04-19-5272-PM Identity and Access Management

Bound uses IdentityServer to secure our identity and access management. We enforce the use of phishing-resistant authentication factors. Bound employees are granted access to applications based on their role, and automatically deprovisioned upon termination of their employment. Further access must be approved according to the policies set for each application.

 

6-1 Vendor Security

Bound uses a risk-based approach to vendor security. Factors which influence the inherent risk rating of a vendor include:

      • Access to customer and corporate data

      • Integration with production environments

      • Potential damage to the Bound brand

Once the inherent risk rating has been determined, the security of the vendor is evaluated in order to determine a residual risk rating and an approval decision for the vendor.

| Data Privacy

At Bound, data privacy is a first-class priority—we strive to be trustworthy stewards of all sensitive data.

 

1-4 Regulatory Compliance

Bound uses IdentityServer to secure our identity and access management. We enforce the use of phishing-resistant authentication factors. Bound employees are granted access to applications based on their role, and automatically deprovisioned upon termination of their employment. Further access must be approved according to the policies set for each application.

 

Privacy Policy

View our Privacy Policy 

View our Student Data Privacy Policy