Cloaked Secures $375 Million to Expand Security and Privacy Solutions
As more and more aspects of our lives become digitally intertwined, the importance of data privacy and security cannot be overstated. However, current consumer-facing security tools often focus on one specific modality, such as password protection, VPNs, or identity management. This forces users to juggle multiple tools to ensure the privacy of their data. This is where Cloaked comes in. The company, which offers a comprehensive bundle of security and privacy solutions, recently announced that it has secured $375 million in Series B funding and growth financing. The funds will be used to expand its consumer offering and delve into the enterprise market. Here
Image Credits:Cloaked
Cloaked’s Journey and Vision
Founded in 2020 by brothers Arjun and Abhijay Bhatnagar, Cloaked initially offered users the ability to create multiple identities, complete with emails, phone numbers, and passwords. This allowed users to log into different services without revealing their actual data. Over the years, the company has expanded its offerings to include services like data removal, identity theft insurance, VPN, and dark web monitoring. They also introduced an AI-powered call screening feature last year.
Now, Cloaked sees an opportunity to further protect consumers in a world where AI technology is increasingly being used by hackers and scammers to obtain data or money in new and sophisticated ways. The company’s CEO, Arjun Bhatnagar, expressed his concerns about the growing capabilities of AI in compromising individuals and the potential implications for personal safety, family security, and financial fraud. He also highlighted the increasing prevalence of scam spam and phishing in the era of pervasive surveillance.
Expanding AI-powered Screening Protection
Cloaked plans to extend its AI-powered screening protection to text messages, email, and web browsing within the year. In an innovative move, the firm is also testing an AI agent capable of acting on behalf of users, such as changing the password for a service whose data has been compromised. Bhatnagar emphasized the company’s commitment to using AI safely and not passing sensitive information to the cloud.
Growth and Expansion into the Enterprise Market
Cloaked reported a 10x growth last year and currently boasts more than 350,000 paying customers. The company has protected 10 million identities and has helped users remove over 1 billion records from data broker sites. Further, since introducing its call-screening feature last year, the app has handled over 50 million scam or spam phone calls.
In addition to its ongoing success in the consumer market, Cloaked is beginning to make inroads into the enterprise market. The company offers employees similar protections to its consumer products, such as identity and password management, and alerts about potential scams. The enterprise solution also allows company CISOs to assess individual risk levels, review aggregated data of records cleaned or scams stopped, and identify potential scams or data breaches that could impact the business.
Image Credits:Cloaked
Cloaked’s Competitive Landscape
Despite competition from major players like 1Password, Gaurdio, Firefox, Proton, and Mozilla, Cloaked has managed to carve out a niche for itself. The company even offers some overlapping products with investor DuckDuckGo, which also provides VPN and identity theft protection.
The recent funding round was spearheaded by General Catalyst and Liberty City Ventures, with contributions from Lux Capital, Human Capital, Marquee Ventures, Fifth Growth Fund, NFL Players Association, LG Technology Ventures, Assurant Ventures, and DuckDuckGo. General Catalyst also provided growth financing through its Customer Value Fund, which offers funding to startups without diluting equity to fuel customer acquisition.
Mark Crane, a partner at General Catalyst, lauded Cloaked’s comprehensive suite of security and privacy offerings, which cater to a wide range of consumer needs. He believes that Cloaked has the right product to protect individuals and enterprises in the new AI-driven internet age. He also commended Cloaked for its ability to provide a reliable “housekeeping seal of approval” for users in a world populated by numerous AI agents.
