Madrid, Cologne / October 14th, 2020. Cologne-based specialist for blockchain-based security technology UBIRCH participated at Prosegur’s open innovation program "COME IN" and was chosen as winner in the category ‘Cybersecurity’. As a result, UBIRCH will collaborate in a pilot together with the Miami-based leading Cybersecurity company Cipher which was acquired by Prosegur in 2018. On finals day, Prosegur elected five winning start-up solutions from its program to join their service ecosystem. Through its initiative, the first of its kind in the private security sector, Prosegur seeks to join forces with entrepreneurial talents to respond to major transformation challenges in the corporate, security, cash management, alarm and cybersecurity areas.

In the words of Prosegur's Director of Innovation, José Daniel García Espinel, "the excellent response to the program highlights the impetus of the start-up ecosystem. Their talent, combined with the enormous potential of Prosegur's technological innovation, have turned future security challenges into real projects that will reinvent the way we protect our environment." Furthermore, he referred to collaborative models as "in combination with Prosegur's international experience and projection, the formula for success to incorporate the external talent of start-ups and accelerate the "go to market" process, thus revolutionizing the security sector". 

Among other things UBIRCH presented a smart lock use case where lock actions are signed and sealed at the point of data creation and anchored in one or several public blockchains. Thus, closing and opening events at private home doors can be tracked reliably and be verified at any point in time, never in a doubt, neither about data authenticity nor data integrity. This creates a new level of trust in data and enables numerous use cases for private home security.

Ed Boucas, CEO of Cipher: "We from the jury are very happy with our decision to select UBIRCH as winner of the PROSEGUR COME IN open innovation challenge in the category cybersecurity. UBIRCH offers a whole new approach to secure IoT devices, by using blockchain to make data itself trustworthy instead of focusing on the transmission channels. Their solution fits into existing architectures and offers an additional layer of trust. The UBIRCH solution is a trigger to extend or even rethink current security approaches to be better prepared for a future, where data from billions of IoT devices must be trusted, also in unmanaged scenarios."

Stephan Noller, Founder and CEO at UBIRCH: "By winning the Prosegur Challenge, we have once again demonstrated that modern and distributed cybersecurity solutions can help companies like Prosegur to incorporate new business areas and devices into their services - even beyond defined system boundaries and infrastructures. The market for smart (home) devices is growing rapidly. Many devices have a security focus - private cameras, smart locks, networked door and window sensors, motion detectors and drones. All these devices are data sources that could be relevant for future services.”

Picked from among the more than 190 start-ups nominated and hailing from 33 different countries, the winning companies will receive support from the different units at Prosegur, Spain's top security multinational, to develop and implement their projects worldwide. In combination with Prosegur's international experience and projection, the formula for success is to incorporate the external talent of start-ups and accelerate the "go to market" process, thus revolutionizing the security sector. Here you can find further information about COME IN: https://www.prosegur.com/comein

About Prosegur:
Prosegur is a global leader in the private security sector. Across its business lines - Prosegur Security, Prosegur Cash, Prosegur Alarms, Prosegur AVOS and Cipher - Prosegur provides companies and households with reliable security services using the most advanced market solutions. With a global presence, Prosegur reported sales of 4.198 billion euros in 2019, and is listed on the Spanish stock exchanges under the ticker code PSG, with a team that currently numbers more than 160,000 employees. The company’s social initiatives are directed through the Prosegur Foundation, which, with 31,111 beneficiaries in 2019, focuses on four key pillars: education, employment inclusion for people with intellectual disabilities, corporate volunteering and cultural development. Further information is available at: www.prosegur.com

About Cipher:
Cipher is the Cybersecurity Division of Prosegur after being acquired in February 2019. Founded in 2000, Cipher is a global cybersecurity company that delivers a wide range of services: Managed Detection and Response (MDR), Managed Security Services (MSS), Cyber Intelligence Services (CIS), Red Team Services (RTS), Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC) and Cybersecurity Technology Integration (CTI). These services are supported by the Cipher Labs, an elite threat and cyber intelligence research and development lab, and also by five 24×7 Security Operations Centers (SOC).

Cipher is a highly accredited company holding ISO 27001, ISO 22301, ISO 20000, ISO 9001, SOC I, SOC II, PCI QSA, PCI ASV, Privacy Shield and CREST certifications. The quality of service has led Cipher to win many awards and distinctions from world-renowned research companies such as Gartner, Frost & Sullivan and Forrester. Clients consist of companies from mid-size enterprises to world-renowned corporations and government agencies, with countless success stories. Further information is available at: www.cipher.com

About UBIRCH:
UBIRCH is the specialist for blockchain-based security technology in the field of IoT with locations in Cologne, Berlin, Munich and Tel Aviv. The team consists of experienced specialists in cryptography, blockchain and data-driven business models. Consisting of an extremely lightweight client for sensor firmware and the matching cloud backend, UBIRCH's "Blockchain for Things" solution enables military-grade data protection to deliver new business models for IoT.

The UBIRCH solution works similar to sealing a contract at the office of a sworn-in notary. The seal can still be broken and the contract changed but not without leaving traces (tamper evidence), and if these traces are detected, the original document can be retrieved from the notary’s archive for comparison. Innovative cryptography and blockchain technologies guarantee the trustworthiness of IoT data. While most other IoT security solutions focus on securing the transmission channel and/or the device, UBIRCH focuses on securing the IoT data-packets individually. The advantage and USP of this approach are pervasiveness, warranted authenticity and order of sequence as the security is attached to the data-packets with these interlinked in a blockchain. They are always secured – even if they have been transmitted over non-secure channels.

UBIRCH technology - deployable as software or on SIM-cards – is aimed primarily at customers in the industrial, smart cities, insurance, healthcare, IoT start-ups, energy supply, and logistics segments. Further information is available www.ubirch.com