Alethea raises $20m Series B funding to mitigate disinformation

Alethea, a tech startup helping the Fortune 500, private companies and nonprofits protect themselves from harms stemming from disinformation, announced the close of $20 million Series B funding round. The funding was led by GV, with participation from Ballistic Ventures, who led Alethea's Series A funding in 2022.

Also participating in the round is Hakluyt Capital, which invests alongside leading venture capital funds, targeting companies with high growth potential and international ambitions. This new investment signifies investor confidence in Alethea's vision, technology capabilities, and the transformative impact the company will have on creating a more secure digital environment. The new funding brings Alethea's total raised to $34 million.

Lisa Kaplan, Founder and CEO, Alethea: "Companies' biggest vulnerabilities today lie outside of their own systems, and the incoming threats we have to worry about are from those who are weaponizing information to break into and manipulate customer, investor, and stakeholder decisions. We built our Artemis product to move organizations from passive listening to active risk management. Since the launch, our customers have been able to use Artemis to detect and prebunk threats early, use our insights to inform mitigation responses, and better protect themselves from increasingly sophisticated adversaries."

With its flagship product, Artemis, Alethea is redefining the early warning of security risks, detecting the first signs of cyber attacks, disinformation and misinformation narratives, and domestic and foreign influence operations earlier than previously possible. Using AI to detect and assess previously invisible risks on niche social media platforms, alternative forums and spaces, and known extremist communities, Artemis alerts communications, risk and intel, and security teams of malicious actors, vulnerable assets, and threats of physical violence. Artemis analyzes billions of data points across a variety of disparate data sources and multiple languages to provide stakeholders with a comprehensive picture of the adversary and their tactics, techniques, and procedures. 

The Series B investment will allow Alethea to scale sales and marketing efforts to bring its solutions to every organization or company with an online presence, grow the team to bring on new functions and expand existing functions, and enhance Artemis' features and capabilities to provide tailored solutions that address evolving customer challenges.

Karim Faris, General Partner, GV: "Alethea takes a novel, machine-learning driven approach to protect company brand reputations from the potential damages of disinformation campaigns and social media manipulation. The rapid acceleration of artificial intelligence creates a more urgent need for Alethea's technology, and the company continues to see strong adoption of its advanced analytics among major enterprises. We're excited to support Lisa Kaplan and the entire team as they protect the bottom lines of Fortune 500 companies in the new AI-driven social information era."

Ted Schlein, Co-founder and General Partner. Ballistic Ventures: "Disinformation is the new malware - yet a far more insidious threat to corporations, individuals and our open democracy. Our continued investment in Alethea underscores our confidence in their innovative approach to empowering a broad range of customers – from the Fortune 50 to the public sector – in combating disinformation and taking actions that safeguard our society's digital future."

Alethea was represented by outside counsel WilmerHale in the Series B transaction.

www.alethea.com