Transportation & Aviation MSSP Providers

How to Evaluate an MSSP for Aviation

• Ask about the provider's experience with TSA cybersecurity directives and whether they support the incident reporting and assessment requirements.
• Understand the MSSP's approach to securing airport and airline OT systems, including baggage handling, access control, and flight operations infrastructure.
• Clarify the provider's experience with passenger data protection regulations, including GDPR for international carriers and PCI DSS for payment processing.
• Ask about their incident response capabilities for aviation environments where certain containment actions require coordination with aviation safety authorities.

Aviation MSSP: Airline vs. Airport Security

Airlines operate reservation systems, flight operations platforms, crew scheduling systems, and in-flight connectivity networks. Their security requirements focus on passenger data protection under GDPR and other privacy regulations, operational continuity for flight dispatch, and protection of loyalty program databases that are frequent targets for credential stuffing. Airlines also face regulatory requirements from multiple aviation authorities across the countries they serve.

Airport operators manage a different security domain: physical access control systems, baggage handling OT, terminal networks shared among tenants, and ground transportation infrastructure. Airports must coordinate security across multiple airlines, concessionaires, and government agencies operating within the same facility. An MSSP serving an airport needs experience with multi-tenant environments and operational technology that differs substantially from airline IT systems.