Venture Capital News: ShoCard Secures $4M
2017-08-22
CUPERTINO, CA, ShoCard, a leading blockchain-based identity management system (IMS), today announces $4 million in funding.
This brings the company's total funding to $5.5 million for the rollout of its enterprise solution, ShoBadge. The new product eliminates the need for usernames and passwords within the enterprise to authorize network and data access, instead using a blockchain-based digital identity verification and authentication process. This investment round was led by existing investors, Morado and AME Cloud Ventures with new participation from Storm Ventures, Danhua Capital, Correlation Ventures, Recruit Strategic Partners and Robert Tinker, founder and former CEO of MobileIron.
Having already built a leading position in consumer identity management, which includes banks and financial institutions, credit-reporting companies, airlines and companies requiring user logins for websites and apps, ShoCard is utilizing the funds to offer the same caliber of efficiency, optimal user experience and superior security for the workplace.
"Eliminating usernames and passwords at the enterprise level will close the security gap in organizations' cyber defenses. Large databases filled with this sensitive information will no longer be necessary, and weak passwords, easily exploited by hackers, will no longer exist," said Armin Ebrahimi, founder and CEO of ShoCard. "ShoBadge will use the ShoCard verification, enrollment and authentication tools that leverage mobile devices along with the blockchain as the next generation of identity management, offering CIOs and CISOs a consolidated approach and more secure identity management for their enterprise."
ShoBadge is able to continue driving its aspirational strategy of offering user-centric identity that transcends enterprise boundaries and enables Bring Your Own ID (BYOID). Using blockchain technology, ShoBadge inverts identify management to be controlled by each user and shared with the workplace. All identification information is encrypted and stored on employee mobile devices. After employees choose to share their information with their employer, the blockchain acts as an immutable ledger to verify the information and ultimately grant access to authorized employees. Using this method, no personally identifiable information (PII) is stored on the blockchain, and information exchanged is incapable of becoming compromised.
"Consolidation in identity management is currently a substantial driver in the enterprise market, and ShoBadge's proprietary use of blockchain technology enables cross-domain authentication," said Tae Hea Nahm, Managing Director at Storm Ventures. "Without usernames and passwords, identity management and security is much more simple and cost-effective. The secret SessionID, private user key, private key of organization/application and any additional verification, such as fingerprint scanning or facial recognition, results in four or five factor authentication, which is an unprecedented level of security for enterprises and their users."
A core benefit of ShoBadge is its ability to be extended to secure the enterprise's entire ecosystem. Beyond employee identity management, partners, sales channels, contractors and customers who need to access the company's systems can use ShoBadge to verify their identities as well, cutting out potentially vulnerable third party security systems. ShoBadge also exists as a complementary solution to existing single sign-on (SSO) systems, and seamlessly integrates into solutions, such as Okta and Azure Active Directory, for easy product deployment and minimal system disruption.
Registration for a demonstration of ShoBadge is available at www.shocard.com/shobadge.
For more information, visit www.shocard.com
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