Think of SOC 2 as a ‘background check’ for a company’s security and operational reliability. If you were a large bank hiring a startup to handle your customers’ financial data, you wouldn’t just take their word that they are ‘secure.’ You would want an independent, expert third party (the auditor) to go into their office, look at their code, check their physical and digital locks, and verify their employee training. A SOC 2 report is the document that auditor writes to say, ‘I checked their systems, and they are doing exactly what they promised to do.’ It replaces the need for every single customer to perform their own individual security audit, saving everyone time and building trust.
