REDCap Security Assessment

CFO

From a financial perspective, this REDCap platform presents good business risk with standard due diligence requirements. The 70/100 security score represents above-average protection that aligns with our operational needs, though several compliance and risk management areas require closer examination before final procurement approval.

Business Risk Analysis

The platform demonstrates strong identity and access management capabilities, which reduces our exposure to insider threats and unauthorized data access incidents that could disrupt research operations. However, the absence of formal compliance certifications creates material compliance risk for our healthcare and research data handling requirements. Without SOC 2 Type II or ISO 27001 attestations, we may face increased audit complexity and potential regulatory scrutiny that could extend procurement timelines and increase administrative overhead.

The lack of comprehensive data protection and encryption documentation raises operational continuity concerns, particularly for our multi-site research collaborations requiring secure data transmission. This gap could necessitate additional security controls and monitoring investments on our end. Additionally, the missing vendor risk management framework suggests limited visibility into their security incident response procedures, which could impact our ability to maintain business continuity during potential security events.

The platform's academic research focus aligns well with our operational requirements, but the incomplete security posture assessment limits our ability to conduct thorough vendor due diligence. This creates procurement inefficiency and may require extended evaluation periods to validate security controls through alternative means.

CFO Recommendation

Recommend approval with enhanced vendor monitoring and specific contractual requirements. Require formal compliance certification roadmap, detailed data protection documentation, and quarterly security posture reviews. Establish clear incident notification protocols and consider cyber insurance implications given the limited risk intelligence available.

CTO/Developer

From a technical integration perspective, REDCap demonstrates good integration capabilities with standard developer tooling, though limited security data suggests a need for enhanced evaluation during implementation planning.

Technical Assessment

REDCap presents a mixed integration profile that requires careful architectural consideration. The platform shows strong identity and access management foundations with an 80/100 score, indicating robust authentication mechanisms and user provisioning capabilities. This suggests well-designed API authentication flows and proper session management, which are critical for enterprise SSO integration and automated user lifecycle management.

However, the absence of comprehensive security data across encryption, application security, and infrastructure dimensions creates significant blind spots for technical planning. Without visibility into API security controls, rate limiting mechanisms, and data protection implementations, integration teams face uncertainty around security requirements and potential technical debt. This data gap particularly impacts API integration planning, where understanding encryption standards, request authentication, and error handling patterns is essential for reliable service integration.

The platform's academic research focus suggests purpose-built APIs for data collection and analysis workflows, potentially offering specialized endpoints for research data management. However, the lack of available pricing and company size information indicates potential challenges in enterprise-grade SLA commitments and technical support escalation paths. Integration teams should anticipate longer evaluation cycles and custom security assessments to fill these knowledge gaps.

Developer experience assessment is hampered by insufficient API documentation visibility, SDK availability data, and integration complexity metrics. This suggests potential challenges in development velocity and ongoing maintenance overhead.

CTO Recommendation

Approve for integration with enhanced security monitoring and comprehensive technical due diligence. Require detailed API security documentation, encryption standard verification, and proof-of-concept integration testing before full deployment. Implement additional logging and monitoring controls to compensate for security visibility gaps during integration.

Legal/Compliance

From a legal and compliance perspective, this platform presents moderate compliance risk requiring enhanced due diligence and contractual protections. The overall security posture demonstrates mixed controls that necessitate careful regulatory evaluation and strengthened vendor management protocols.

Regulatory Compliance Analysis

The absence of fundamental compliance certifications represents the primary legal concern. Without SOC 2 Type II certification, we lack independent validation of the vendor's control environment for security, availability, and confidentiality. This gap complicates our due diligence obligations under various regulatory frameworks and may require additional audit provisions in our vendor agreement.

The lack of documented GDPR compliance poses significant data protection risk, particularly given our European operations. Article 28 of the GDPR requires that data processors provide sufficient guarantees regarding technical and organizational measures. Without explicit GDPR compliance documentation, we face potential regulatory exposure and must implement enhanced contractual safeguards including detailed data processing terms, breach notification procedures, and deletion protocols.

HIPAA compliance status remains unclear, which presents challenges for any healthcare-related data processing. If this platform will handle protected health information, we must obtain business associate agreements and detailed security attestations to satisfy regulatory requirements under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act.

The vendor's breach history appears clean, which supports our risk assessment, but the limited transparency around security controls creates ongoing compliance monitoring obligations. Our legal team must establish enhanced audit rights and regular security attestations to maintain regulatory compliance throughout the vendor relationship.

Legal Recommendation

Conditional approval requiring enhanced Data Processing Agreement with specific provisions for GDPR compliance attestation, annual SOC 2 audit requirements, detailed breach notification procedures, and quarterly security control reviews. Implementation should be limited to non-sensitive data categories pending compliance certification completion.