# AWS Secret Region > AWS Secret Region is a specialized cloud environment designed to host workloads at the Secret security classification level for the U.S. Intelligence Community and other government agencies. Launched in 2017, it is an air-gapped infrastructure that provides the same APIs and tools as commercial AWS regions while remaining isolated from the public internet. - URL: https://optimly.ai/brand/aws-secret-region - Slug: aws-secret-region - BAI Score: 85/100 - Archetype: Challenger - Category: Cloud Computing - Last Analyzed: April 10, 2026 - Part of: Amazon Web Services (AWS) (https://optimly.ai/brand/amazon-web-services-aws) ## Competitors - Google Distributed Cloud Hosted (GDC Hosted) (https://optimly.ai/brand/google-distributed-cloud-hosted) - Leidos (https://optimly.ai/brand/leidos) - Microsoft Azure Government Secret (https://optimly.ai/brand/microsoft-azure-government-secret) - Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Oci Government Cloud (https://optimly.ai/brand/oracle-cloud-infrastructure-oci-government-cloud) ## Also Referenced By - Oracle Cloud for Government (Secret) (https://optimly.ai/brand/oracle-cloud-for-government-secret) - Azure Government Secret Il6 (https://optimly.ai/brand/azure-government-secret-il6) ## Buyer Intent Signals Problems: On-Premises High-Security Data Centers: Maintaining physical data centers with air-gapped networks and armed security on-site. | Legacy Hardware Silos: Continuing to use legacy specialized hardware and dedicated private circuits without cloud orchestration. Solutions: cloud for secret level workloads | most secure cloud for small business | AWS Intelligence Community cloud region | air gapped cloud providers for enterprise | Commercial Cloud + Bring Your Own Key (BYOK): Using high-end encryption on standard commercial cloud regions with self-managed keys. Comparisons: AWS Secret Region vs Azure Government Secret