ClassLink Wins Dual SmartBrief Reader's Choice Honors for Protecting School Data

June 17, 2026
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Clifton, NJ - June 17, 2026 - SmartBrief has named ClassLink a winner of its 2026 Reader’s Choice Awards, recognizing the ClassLink Suite across two categories: Safety & Security and Cybersecurity. This distinction highlights ClassLink’s commitment to protecting students, school data, and the digital environments where learning happens every day.

Key Highlights

  • Safety & Security Winner: ClassLink Suite
  • Cybersecurity Winner: ClassLink Suite
  • Recognized for proactive and layered security tools including SSO, MFA, dark web monitoring, and PII masking
  • Honored for creating safer digital environments for students, educators, and the communities they serve

Recognized by EdTech’s Most-Read Professionals

Each year, the SmartBrief Reader’s Choice Awards recognize the companies and products making a meaningful and lasting impact in education. Voted on by SmartBrief’s audience of top-level education professionals, these awards reflect the tools that K–12 administrators, educators, and technology leaders trust most to solve real challenges in their schools and districts.

Safety & Security: Protecting the Digital Learning Environment

The Safety & Security category honors products and solutions that ensure the safety of students and school facilities, including surveillance tools and solutions that monitor students’ online activity on school-owned devices. The ClassLink Suite was recognized in this category for tools that give administrators clear visibility and control over who accesses digital resources and how, helping schools maintain safe online learning environments.

LaunchPad provides secure single sign-on (SSO) with multi-factor authentication (MFA), ensuring only authorized users can access digital resources — including applications that don’t natively support strong authentication. Security Center gives administrators centralized control over access policies and security events, providing the oversight schools need to respond quickly and confidently.

Cybersecurity: Defending School Data Against Modern Threats

The Cybersecurity category recognizes products and services that protect school-owned data and devices. ClassLink earned this recognition for its proactive, multi-layered approach to data protection that goes beyond traditional security measures.

ThreatScan proactively scans the dark web for compromised credentials, shifting security from reactive to proactive before breaches can impact students and staff. DataGuard masks personally identifiable information before it’s shared with vendors, reducing exposure risk at every touchpoint. Together, these tools address the full spectrum of cybersecurity challenges facing today’s schools.

Celebrating Innovation That Protects and Empowers

“The awards recognize and shine light on new and existing products and solutions that impact and transform education through technology. Our readers and subscribers have selected our winners as the best of the best. Every winner should be really proud of their accomplishments - a well-deserved congratulations from the entire awards team.”

SmartBrief Editorial Team

“Data security is our responsibility to every student, family, and educator who trusts schools with their data and their children. Receiving recognition in both the Safety & Security and Cybersecurity categories reflects our team’s dedication to building tools that meet schools where they are, and protecting them against the threats they face every day.”

Jerri Kemble
National Academic Advisor, ClassLink

About ClassLink

ClassLink is the identity and access management platform trusted by over 25 million students and staff in more than 3,000 school systems worldwide. ClassLink simplifies access with single sign-on, automates provisioning and rostering, and strengthens security and governance across the school system. With analytics that connect edtech usage to student outcomes, ClassLink helps education leaders manage technology with confidence and invest in what works. Learn more at classlink.com.

About ClassLink

About

SmartBrief

SmartBrief is the leading digital news service for top-level education professionals in K-12, higher education and specialized fields. Each SmartBrief is distributed for free and is specifically targeted to help administrators manage, teachers educate and students learn. They work closely with leading trade associations, professional organizations and corporations to create these news round-ups for their members and industries.

ClassLink is a trademark of ClassLink, Inc.