StealthMole, an AI-powered darkish net intelligence startup that focuses on monitoring cyber threats and detecting cybercrime, introduced Thursday that it has raised a $7 million Sequence A funding spherical.

The Singapore-headquartered startup with an R&D workplace in South Korea will use the recent capital to ascertain further R&D facilities and assist extra business makes use of of its know-how within the B2B sector and geographical enlargement.

“Having an R&D workplace in South Korea permits us to achieve crucial insights into how hackers from East Asia function,” Simon Choi, chief know-how officer (CTO) at StealthMole, informed TechCrunch. “Equally, having researchers from numerous backgrounds in Singapore for Southeast Asia, or in different distinctive places, will help us in analyzing knowledge associated to neighboring international locations.”

StealthMole was co-founded in 2022 by Louis Hur (CEO), an enterprise IT safety professional and serial entrepreneur in cybersecurity, and Choi (CTO), a menace investigator and open supply intelligence (OSINT) profiler who beforehand labored as an adviser for the Nationwide Intelligence Service South Korea, the Nationwide Police Company, and the Ministry of Nationwide Protection in South Korea.

The startup serves over 50 purchasers throughout 17 international locations in Asia, Europe, and the Center East. Its present buyer base principally consists of authorities and regulation enforcement companies for nationwide safety and cybersecurity groups inside enterprises, which handle cybersecurity incidents, analyze threats, and supply cybersecurity steering and assist.

“StealthMole happened from a crucial market hole I encountered whereas working in cybersecurity and white-hat hacking: a extreme lack of information factors and knowledge networks, particularly inside Asia,” Hur mentioned within the firm’s assertion. “On the identical time, knowledge leaks, anonymized transactions, and all method of cybercrimes have been spiking — each as a result of malicious intent and human error. To higher perceive digital threats, it’s essential for regulation enforcement, intelligence companies, company safety groups, and cybersecurity consultants to analyse regional contexts and their impression on illicit actions.”

The outfit says it traces criminals utilizing 255 billion analyzed knowledge factors from the darkish net, deep net and numerous hidden sources, together with leaked databases, cybercriminals’ blogs and Telegram.

One differentiator from its opponents within the cybersecurity trade is its distinctive experience in Asia-related threats, Kevin Yoo, chief working officer (COO) at StealthMole, informed TechCrunch. In response to a report by Examine Level Analysis, Asia witnessed the best year-on-year surge in weekly cyberattacks within the first quarter of 2023 as a result of fast digital transformation; the rise of the hybrid workforce and Asia’s manufacturing trade, like semiconductors that maintain mental property, may very well be a goal for cyber espionage.

“The excessive demand for Asia-oriented menace data underscores the distinctiveness and worth of our dataset for patrons worldwide, inside and past Asia,” Yoo mentioned. 

Korea Funding Companions led the Sequence A spherical with participation from Hibiscus Fund (a three way partnership between RHL Ventures, Penjana Kapital and KB Funding) and Smilegate Funding.