Cloudflare Introduces Project Safekeeping

Cloudflare today announced a new Impact Initiative to provide Zero Trust security at no cost to small and medium critical infrastructure organisations around the world. This new program, named Project Safekeeping, aims to protect under-resourced organisations that provide a critical community benefit but are at high risk for cyberattacks, with initial efforts focused in Australia, Germany, Japan, Portugal, and the United Kingdom.

“We know cyberattacks are on the rise and that critical infrastructure is a common target. But we know that when governments buckle down on security, that often means the largest institutions are protected, at the expense of small communities,” said Matthew Prince, co-founder and CEO, Cloudflare. “Given the success we’ve had with our critical infrastructure program in the United States, we’re excited to bring it to more countries around the world. Cloudflare is the only company ensuring that Zero Trust is accessible to the smaller infrastructure organisations that are most vulnerable, and most relied upon in their communities – the local health clinics, energy providers, or local utilities that keep communities running.”

Government resources are typically allocated to the largest and most visible critical infrastructure – immense financial institutions, hospital networks, oil pipelines, and airports. However, small organisations that are the foundation of communities are also at risk, and often reliant on external support, grants, and volunteers: the neighbourhood health clinic, water treatment facility, and local energy provider that fulfil fundamental needs. Cloudflare’s Project Safekeeping will build on the Critical Infrastructure Defense Program, created in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to protect US infrastructure. Cloudflare will now expand support to the global community, initially focusing efforts in Australia, Germany, Japan, Portugal, and the United Kingdom.

Small Organisations Need Equal Access to Zero Trust

Eligible entities in these regions will gain access to enterprise-level Zero Trust cybersecurity services, as well as world-class application security products like DDOS protection and Web Application Firewall (WAF) for free. Now, at-risk critical infrastructure entities can begin their Zero Trust journey and:

• Connect users to applications: Real-time verification of every user to every application protects internal resources and defends against potential data breaches.
• Filter traffic: A secure web gateway (SWG) prevents cyber threats and data breaches by filtering unwanted content from web traffic, blocking unauthorised user behaviour, and enforcing company security policies.
• Secure cloud applications: A cloud access security broker, or CASB, performs several security functions for cloud-hosted services (e.g., SaaS, IaaS, and PaaS applications). Standard CASBs secure confidential data through access control and data loss prevention, reveal shadow IT, and ensure compliance with data privacy regulations.
• Protect sensitive data: Data Loss Prevention (DLP) secures your organisation’s most sensitive data in transit.
• Prevent phishing attacks: Area 1 pre-emptively blocks phishing, Business Email Compromise attacks, malware-less fraud, and other incessant attacks coming through email.

To be eligible, Project Safekeeping participants must be non-profit entities, local government entities, and small and medium-sized private organisations whose primary focus is providing services that are vital to their communities’ health, safety and basic economic needs.