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Recent reports have every agency asking: if one credential were exposed, what could it open?
The answer will surprise you. Most agencies cannot produce it. Vendor keys are issued once, rarely expire and are never checked against what the contract permits. One over-scoped key exposes every candidate and client record you hold.
Akòvya-SRT holds each vendor to exactly what its agreement allows, every time it touches your data, and keeps a record of every decision.
Third-party vendor breaches are the fastest-growing attack vector, and among the most expensive. Recent reports have agency owners asking a simple question.
For most agencies the honest answer is more than they’d like. Vendors connect to the ATS with credentials that give them access well beyond what their agreements allow, and nothing checks the difference when data moves. AI tools make it urgent, because they act at a speed and scale no person can review.
In a read-only review of one vendor’s credential, 17 of 20 record types returned data, including record types its agreement never called for. There was no exploit and no stolen credential. That measures breadth, not misuse. But breadth is what counts when a credential leaks, a vendor is breached, or an automated tool goes further than anyone intended.
Akòvya-SRT holds each vendor to what its agreement allows. Every request is checked when it is made, and every decision is recorded.
Every staffing agency has vendor integrations. None can check, at the moment a vendor makes a request, whether it matches what that vendor agreed to.
What that disconnect looks like in practice. These figures reflect our analysis of the vendor ecosystems around the major ATS platforms and what those platforms publicly support today:
When a staffing agency connects a vendor to their main applicant-tracking system (ATS), they issue an API key. That key grants access. The contract spells out what the vendor may do: which fields and records it can touch, and for how long. But the contract and the API key are completely disconnected. The vendor can access whatever the key allows, regardless of what the statement of work (SOW) says. When the contract ends, the key doesn't expire. When a vendor is breached, your candidate data flows out through their systems, and the agreement meant to govern all of it remains inert: a legal artifact with no enforcement mechanism at the system layer.
Vendor API keys are issued once and rarely expire. They aren't bound to the contract, aren't checked at runtime, and are hard to revoke without breaking other integrations. Most agencies find out only after something goes wrong, because the credential model was never built to control access in the first place.
Each vendor’s access is matched to its own agreement: the records and fields it signed up for, and for how long. Every request is checked when it is made, every decision is recorded, and access ends when the agreement does.
Dozens of integrations per firm, more attack surface than almost any other SMB vertical.
Personal records, compensation, SSNs: candidate data carries the highest breach liability.
AI and automation now run through these workflows at a speed and volume they were never designed for.
Time-critical placements mean security tooling that disrupts operations gets switched off.
Regulatory exposure on data handling is rising, and most agencies have no defensible audit record.
It’s natural to assume a serious breach only happens to billion-dollar platforms. The data says the opposite. Attackers favor smaller firms precisely because they expect fewer defenses, leaner teams, and standing vendor access that no one is watching.
And the math just changed. AI has been a real gift to agencies like yours: answers at your fingertips, a tireless partner beside your team at all hours. The trouble is, attackers got the same tools. The speed that helps you source candidates now helps them pick targets, probe for weak spots, and launch convincing attacks at a scale that used to take a whole team.
The question was never whether you’re big enough to be a target.
It’s whether the door is locked when someone tries it.
Most agencies already have sensible protections. They are necessary. None of them checks a vendor’s request against its agreement at the moment it is made.
| Safeguard | Knows the agreement | Acts when the request is made | Prevents, not only detects | What it leaves open |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Contracts | ✓ Yes | No | No | State the limits, but nothing applies them |
| Platform permissions | No | ✓ Yes | Partial | Broad by design; can’t read your agreement |
| Security reviews | Partial | No | Partial | Check a vendor once, at onboarding |
| Logs and audits | No | No | No | Tell you what happened after it happened |
| Credential resets | No | No | Partial | Close everything at once, so they get put off |
| Akòvya-SRT | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | Built for this gap |
Akòvya-SRT holds each vendor to what its agreement allows. Every request is checked when it is made, and every decision is recorded. We never keep any of your data: nothing is stored. Your recruiters work exactly as before. What changes is your exposure. Patent-pending.
Six things you get, alongside your existing ATS. No disruption to recruiters. Your IT effort is stated in writing, for your agency, before you start.
Each vendor’s access reflects its own agreement: the record types, fields and purposes it signed up for, and nothing broader.
Every request is checked when it is made. Within the agreement, it goes ahead. Outside it, it is refused. Where judgment is needed, it goes to a person you name.
When an agreement ends, the vendor’s access ends with it, with nothing for anyone to remember to shut off.
End any vendor’s access on its own. Your other vendors keep working.
Every request, decision and exception is recorded as it happens, so the evidence you would need for a client, an auditor, or a compliance review is already there.
When a vendor needs something outside its agreement, you decide. The decision is recorded and added to the agreement before access is allowed.
Give us read-only access to your ATS and we set what each vendor can access against what its agreement allows: which vendors have more access than they agreed to, whose access never ends, and what they can access that they shouldn’t. One free report per agency. Nothing stored, nothing changed.
Share read-only access on a short call. We never store your credentials.
We set what each vendor can access against what its agreement actually allows.
A plain-language report of over-scoped, expired, and unbound access. Yours to keep, no strings.
Akòvya-SRT was built so the thing protecting your data never has to hold it. Here is what we commit to.
Akòvya-SRT never stores your candidates, contacts, or placements, so there is no copy of your data for anyone to breach.
You can end the pilot, or any one vendor’s governance, at any time, and vendor access returns to how it was.
Data stays on US infrastructure, and Akovya-SRT, Inc. is a Delaware C-corporation, a deliberate, US-grounded data-sovereignty posture.
A record of what each vendor did, and when, that you can export.
It starts with the free, read-only Vendor Access Report. Then your first vendor is held to its agreement at no charge, alongside your existing setup. We review results together at Day 45 and discuss pricing; nothing is charged until you agree to it in writing. By Day 90 you have a record of every decision and a clear picture of the gap between what your agreements say and what your vendors can access. Your IT effort is stated in writing before you sign. Pilot cohorts are small; ask us which cohort is open.
We’re onboarding a small group of staffing and recruiting agencies ahead of general availability. Early agencies get their vendors held to their agreements first, and a direct hand in where the product goes.
Put Akòvya-SRT to work for your agency before general availability. Close the gap between contract and access now, not later.
A seat on the pilot review board, founding membership in the industry association, and research written with you to publish as your own.
Work directly with the people who built it. Your use cases shape the roadmap. No account-manager layer, no sales-rep handoff.
Akòvya is built from two roots: one heritage and one promise.
The name is a deliberate tribute to Michelle Petigny, Founder and Chief Architect of Kokomo Systems, whose Haitian heritage is foundational to the company's identity and values. The suffix -vya carries the Latin via, meaning through or by way of. Akòvya is, precisely, the agreement through which all permissioned access flows.
"The name was chosen to honor a culture with a centuries-long understanding of what it means to assert sovereignty over what is rightfully yours, and to build a company whose core promise is returning that sovereignty to the businesses that have long been without it."
The platform runs zero-touch. The relationships don’t. When you work with Akòvya-SRT you get senior, hands-on people: system architecture, AI governance, and decades of operating experience. No sales-rep mill.
Founder of Kokomo Systems and architect of the platform Akòvya-SRT runs on. Three-decade track record in transformative technology, from trusted computing and blockchain infrastructure to AI governance and digital asset systems. Patent holder in fintech; the current work is patent-pending. McKinsey alum.
Heads Akòvya-SRT’s staffing and recruiting vertical: agency relationships and outreach. McKinsey alum, with recruiting experience of her own. Decades of large-scale operations in regulated, multi-campus organizations, spanning admissions, enrollment, and customer success.
Drives the pilot program day to day and supports Wendy on agency sales: demos, pipeline, and the plain-language buyer education that sets us apart.
Builds and automates, under Michelle’s direction, the agency market map and CRM she designed for Akòvya-SRT’s outreach: roughly two thousand staffing firms organized by the system they run.
No. Recruiters keep using the ATS exactly as they do today. Akòvya-SRT governs what vendors can access, not how your people work.
Vendors gain too: clearer scope, and a record showing they stayed inside it. You choose which vendor goes first, and we help you make the ask.
You can stop at any time, and vendor access returns to how it was. The pilot runs alongside your existing setup throughout.
None of your candidate, contact, or placement data. We keep a record of what each vendor did and when, which is yours to export.
The Vendor Access Report is free, and your first vendor is governed at no charge. We discuss pricing at the Day 45 review. Nothing is charged until you agree to it in writing.
Bullhorn first. If you run another platform, tell us; we decide coverage case by case.
Request early access, request a demo, or ask us anything. We respond personally. No automation, no sales-rep handoff.
founders@akovya-srt.com · You’ll hear back from us within one business day.