DHS S&T Awards Apcerto $1.6M to Enhance Mobile App Security Solutions

ASHBURN, Va., Sept. 06, 2017 -- Apcerto, Inc. of Ashburn, Virginia, was awarded a Cooperative Agreement by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) in the amount of $1.6M to research and develop solutions for normalizing and rating mobile applications based on predefined standards as well as to develop a framework for orchestrating the entire mobile application security process.

The solution is based on a machine learning mobile application—Risk Rating Framework—developed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lincoln Laboratory. Apcerto, having commercialized the technology, seeks to provide a testbed for mobile application security orchestration and the normalization of results to standards including the National Information Assurance Partnership, the Open Web Application Security Project, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, and the Sarbanes–Oxley Act.

"Government clients need an automated way to orchestrate mobile security to keep up with mission demand," said Tom Suder, President of Apcerto. "We are pleased to partner with DHS S&T on this important effort."

A priority element within Apcerto’s research and development effort is to support DHS S&T’s partnership with the National Institute of Standards and Technology for the Static Analysis Tool Exposition research project in its newly introduced mobile application testing tool analysis component. Apcerto will integrate with security tool vendors and translate their respective outputs to a scoring system. The platform will provide a sustainable model of security analysis as a service that enables the public and private sectors to vet mobile applications and create secure mobile solutions.

Apcerto recognizes the critical need to partner with different domains of the mobile security ecosystem and aims to bring them together in a unified platform. For example, by integrating with AirWatch VMware, a partner on Apcerto’s team, and potentially other enterprise mobility management solutions in the future, Apcerto will enable a high level of automation in the detection and remediation process of potential privacy or security issues introduced by mobile apps. Apcerto’s team also includes Acumen Security, the Advanced Technology Academic Research Center, Perfecto Mobile, Red Hat, and Samsung.

About Apcerto
Apcerto, a mobile security orchestration company, brings the benefits of enterprise mobility management (EMM) to mobile application security.  Apcerto normalizes and rates mobile applications based on predefined standards and provides frameworks for orchestrating the entire mobile application security process. Apcerto helps agencies and enterprises create custom security policies, standards and criteria to meet their mission specific challenges.

Contact
Marika Robertson
[email protected]
571.293.1161