SOC 2 Compliance for Heroku
Heroku abstracts away much of the infrastructure complexity, but achieving SOC 2 still requires careful configuration of access controls, logging, and environment management.
Core Heroku Controls
Heroku Teams & Permissions
Use Heroku Teams for organization-wide access control. Enforce MFA for all accounts and use fine-grained permissions (Admin, Member, Collaborator) to follow least privilege.
Logging & Monitoring (Logplex)
Use Heroku Logplex to drain logs to a third-party logging service (like Papertrail, Splunk, or Datadog) for long-term retention and security auditing.
Private Spaces
For enhanced security and compliance, use Heroku Private Spaces to isolate applications in a dedicated network and enforce IP whitelisting for backend services.
Environment Secrets
Use Heroku Config Vars to manage secrets. Never commit secrets to source control. Audit changes to Config Vars via the Heroku Audit Logs.
Auditor-Vetted Best Practices
Enable Heroku's automated certificate management (ACM) to ensure all traffic is encrypted via SSL/TLS.
Use Heroku Private Spaces if your compliance requirements demand dedicated network isolation and peering.
Regularly review Heroku Team membership and permission levels as part of your quarterly access reviews.
Implement a CI/CD pipeline using Heroku Pipelines to ensure consistent, auditable deployments across environments.
Infrastructure-as-Code is Key
The fastest way to achieve SOC 2 on Heroku is to define your entire environment in code. This provides an immutable audit trail that auditors love.
View IaC ChecklistKevin A
Principal Security & GRC Engineer
Kevin is a security engineer turned GRC specialist. He focuses on mapping cloud-native infrastructure (AWS/Azure/GCP) to modern compliance frameworks, ensuring that security controls are both robust and auditor-ready without slowing down development cycles.
SOC 2 and Heroku FAQs
How does Heroku support SOC 2 compliance?
Heroku provides native security controls (IAM, logging, encryption) that map to SOC 2 Trust Service Criteria. Proper configuration and evidence collection from Heroku can satisfy a significant portion of technical control requirements.
What SOC 2 controls map to Heroku?
Common mappings include: access control (IAM/users and roles), change management (audit logs and deployment pipelines), logical access (MFA and least privilege), and monitoring (logging and alerting). See our implementation guide above for platform-specific control mapping.
How do we collect evidence from Heroku for our audit?
Evidence from Heroku typically includes: configuration exports, access review reports, audit/activity logs, and encryption settings. Compliance automation tools can pull evidence continuously; otherwise, export and store evidence per your auditor's requirements.
Does Heroku integrate with compliance automation (Vanta, Drata)?
Most major cloud and SaaS platforms, including Heroku, offer integrations or APIs used by compliance automation tools. Check your automation provider's integration list and enable the Heroku connector for continuous evidence collection.
About RiscLens
Our mission is to provide transparency and clarity to early-stage technology companies navigating the complexities of SOC 2 (System and Organization Controls 2) compliance.
Who we serve
Built specifically for early-stage and growing technology companies—SaaS, fintech, and healthcare tech—preparing for their first SOC 2 audit or responding to enterprise customer requirements.
What we provide
Clarity before commitment. We help teams understand realistic cost ranges, timeline expectations, and common gaps before they engage auditors or expensive compliance vendors.
Our Boundaries
We do not provide legal advice, audit services, or certifications. Our assessments support internal planning—they are not a substitute for professional compliance guidance.
SOC 2 (System and Organization Controls 2) is a voluntary compliance standard for service organizations, developed by the AICPA, which specifies how organizations should manage customer data based on the Trust Services Criteria: security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, and privacy.
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