Averon closes $8.3M funding to make smartphones the key to ID online

As the threat of cyber attacks increases, sign in and identity verification procedures are becoming utterly cumbersome. There’s no “identity” layer to the internet (until there is a mainstream Blockhain solution perhaps?).

However, using signalling and data packets, and the SIM/eSIM chips already found in smartphones, you could make this much easier. It would also require no installation and much less effort for users, and could be rolled out in areas like IoT.

This is what SF-based startup Averon is working on. They call it Direct Autonomous Authentication (DAA), or a mobile identity verification standard that is both pretty frictionless and very secure.

Averon has now closed an $8.3 million Series A financing round led by Avalon Ventures. The idea is to make the hacks involving Equifax, Target, Home Depot, Anthem Medicare, a thing of the past.

Developed in stealth for nearly two years, Averon’s security solution takes the real-time mobile network signal from your phone and the SIM/eSIM chips to create authentication.

With existing solutions, users manually enter ID info on their device, use 2-factor authentications, and biometric info that is easily breached and prone to human error. Your mobile carrier actually knows who you are, but so far packet device origination tracking (SIM) has been limited to carrier use and carriers themselves have been viewed as siloed networks. This solution breaks down the barriers.

Wendell Brown, CEO and chairman of Averon says DAA “has the potential to substantially reduce the exposure each of us has to the growing wave of cybercriminals.” His co-founder is Lea Tarnowski, a former UK-based VC partner.

Tarnowski was formerly an investment manager at Northzone Ventures, one of Europe’s leading global venture capital funds.

Brown is an acclaimed computer scientist, entrepreneur, and inventor known for his innovations in telco and mobile security with 20 years of expertise in cryptosecurity and a U.S. Department of Defense security.

Averon is led by a cadre of business leaders, engineers and cybersecurity experts with backgrounds spanning MIT, Harvard Business School, Stanford, USC, Cornell, the NSA, the Israel Defense Force, PayPal, Microsoft, and other top universities and institutions. It’s also the creator and holder of IP protected by 15 U.S. and international patents.