Identity Verification Platform IDfy Secures $27 Million in Funding

6 Mar 2024 , 10:53 AM

Elev8, KB Investment, Tenacity Ventures, and other investors have contributed a total of $27 million to IDfy, a platform that combines identity verification with digital onboarding.

The company said on March 6 that the Mumbai-based fraud detection tool will utilize the money to expand internationally and further solidify its position. 

‘Our goal is to build trust and eradicate fraud.’ The money will support our product development and expansion goals, allowing us to assist even more companies and open doors for reliable individuals and companies, co-founder Ashok Hariharan said. 

IDfy was established in 2011 by Hariharan and Vineet Jawa. The company provides services and solutions for employee background checks, digital onboarding, risk and fraud prevention, KYC, and KYB. 

‘To perform a thorough investigation, we examine hundreds of data points, including public court records, bank statements, and asset verification, among others. Fraud is a dynamic field that requires specialized platforms for businesses to navigate, according to Hariharan.

A prior series D investment sponsored by Blume Ventures, an early stage venture capital firm, and TransUnion, a company listed on the New York Stock Exchange, saw IDfy raise ₹86 Crore. 

Operating out of India, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East, Baldor Technologies Pvt Ltd claims to handle more than 60 million verifications each month for more than 1,500 clients in the BFSI, FMCG, e-commerce, gaming, and sharing economy sectors.

Among the well-known brands are American Express, HDFC Bank, AxisBank, Zomato, PhonePe, Paytm, HUL, and PhonePe. The business reported revenue of ₹120 Crore for FY23 and states that it has been EBITDA positive ever since. 

Fraud detection and identity verification are two of the fastest-growing industries worldwide. The widespread use of faked documents and deepfake technology in identity fraud has become a major threat to society as a whole. 

A Gartner study stated that over the last ten years, a number of turning points in the field of artificial intelligence have transpired that permit the production of synthetic images. Malicious actors may exploit these synthetically created pictures of real people’s faces, or ‘deepfakes,’ to compromise or obstruct biometric authentication.

Because they won’t be able to determine if the face of the person being verified is a deepfake or a real person, organizations may start to doubt the validity of identity verification and authentication solutions. 

In order to address this, platforms such as IDfy, Perfios, Signzy, and Hyperverge have developed a number of integrated solutions that enable businesses to thoroughly screen their clients, employees, and potential partners in addition to obtaining KYC and Officially Valid Documents (OVD) such as passports, driving licenses, voter identification cards, and Aadhaar.

To outbid these scammers, they assert, they would use massive LLM models, a multi-layered approach, and cutting-edge technology.

For example, IDfy handles the entire loan process for a lender, gathering all the borrower’s information, including video KYC, verifying it with technology to ensure it is authentic, and completing the onboarding process and consent signing.

According to Hariharan, ‘We are among the first with a DPDP compliance platform in our system.’ 

According to a GII Research analysis, the Indian identity verification market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 16.42% between 2023 and 2030.

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