CounterCraft, a disruptive cybersecurity company, has raised 1 million euros from Adara Ventures, Orza Investments, Telefónica Open Future_, through its startup accelerator Wayra and a development grant, to further product development and accelerate growth. CounterCraft is the first joint investment between these world-class investors whose expertise and track record in the cybersecurity provide important benefits to the project.
CounterCraft has developed an innovative security solution that uses deception techniques and tools to detect, study and manipulate adversaries. This combats the increasing number of cyber-attacks, and cyber-espionage incidents that large organisations and governments are experiencing. CounterCraft enables the use of counter intelligence campaigns to foil the espionage and intelligence operations of adversaries. Deception technologies are emerging as an important force in cyber defence and Gartner identifies them as one of the top 10 Technologies for Information Security in 2016. According to Gartner “by 2018, 10% of enterprises will use deception tools and tactics, and actively participate in deception operations against attackers”.
“Companies must be aware of who their adversaries are and what’s happening beyond the perimeter of their IT system. Our proprietary technology covers a wide range of different assets that are planned to mislead adversaries and cause them to take specific actions to aid computer security defence and advanced threat detection” explains David Barroso, CEO and Founder at CounterCraft. He continues “We propose something new: don’t stop attacks. Let us provide a controlled environment for attacks to take place. If not, your adversaries will just come back when you clean up their intrusion”.
The Team at CounterCraft, including David Barroso (CEO), Fernando Braquehais (Software Architect), Dan Brett (CMO)
CounterCraft was founded in September 2015 by a group of world-renowned cyber security experts David Barroso (CEO), Dan Brett (CMO) and Fernando Braquehais (Security Architect). Since founding, 9 months ago, CounterCraft has gained strong momentum with Fortune Global 2000 clients in the financial, retail and energy sector and the government. CounterCraft was a winner of the INCIBE (National Cybersecurity Institute) accelerator programme and has received funding from the CDTI (Development Agency) through the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and by BicGipuzkoa through the SPRI (Basque Business Development Agency) to continue the development of their disruptive and innovative solution.
Cybersecurity is a key investment theme for Adara and Telefónica and they provide vision, contacts and experience in the cyber sector. Orza brings long-term focus and experience from a long history of technology investments. The investors appreciate the product’s holistic vision of the deception field and the founding team’s experience. The funds invested will enable CounterCraft to accelerate product development, fund international expansion and promote its leadership position within the EU.
Mr Alberto Gómez, Managing Partner at Adara Ventures said “CounterCraft’s founders have a unique combination of technical depth, market knowledge and credibility which should enable them to execute on their ambitious vision for the counter intelligence space. This was our main motivation for investing in them. CounterCraft has the most complete vision for addressing the needs of large enterprises we have seen. Moreover, the company offers its clients the opportunity to leapfrog current deceptive offerings with a more comprehensive, dynamic and effective solution. The EMEA market appreciates vendors with cutting-edge vision and technology, together with the focus and proximity to serve their needs.”
Mr Aitor Arrizabalaga, Managing Director at Orza said “When we met CounterCraft, we had no doubt, we had to bet on their product. CounterCraft had all the ingredients we look for in a startup: it was a very ambitious project with international vision, it had a great team with experience in the technology sector and, of course, it was a project with a great product and massive growth potential.”
Mr. Andrés Saborido, Country Manager at Wayra, said: “Telefónica is very active in cybersecurity, which we predict to be one of the highest growing industries over the upcoming years. In this context, CounterCraft’s founding team is extremely experienced: David Barroso was CTO at Eleven Paths, Telefonica’s company focused on security, and eventually decided to create his own startup. We are now firmly betting on the security solution they have developed. At Wayra, we are very interested in participating in companies at CounterCraft’s stage, which are consolidated, that provide innovative solutions and with high-value for Telefónica.”