Pyrra Technologies – a company whose cutting-edge AI identifies threats across alternative social media – announced the completion of their series seed raise totaling $2.3 million. And the funding received will be deployed to accelerate the Company’s technical roadmap and market expansion plans. The investment round was led by Ducera Investments with participation from Andav Capital and Growth Science Ventures.
Pyrra – which launched in late 2021 – started as a research and development project of Human Rights First, a historic non-governmental organization (NGO) based in New York. With financial, reputational, operational, and physical attacks inspired and organized by content on alternative social media platforms continuing to surge, Pyrra identified a unique opportunity to develop a suite of solutions that enables customers to stay ahead of emerging threats. Over the past 2 years, demand for Pyrra’s commercial products — Discover, Protect— and the company’s new API solution have increasingly been embraced by both private and public-sector customers.
The need for monitoring and tracking the ever-expanding alt-social space grows as users flee traditional social media sites and seek like-minded and unmoderated spaces online. And the threats emanating from the alternative social media ecosystem continue apace, necessitating the deployment of AI-powered solutions for identifying potential threats quickly and accurately before they cause real-world harm. And Pyrra is currently used by almost twenty organizations including security teams at Fortune 500 companies across a variety of industries, media outlets, NGOs, and academic researchers.
KEY QUOTES:
“There has always been hate speech in the dark corners of the Internet. Most of it stays online, but it’s increasingly leading to harm and violence in the real world. This is something only AI can tackle at scale, since the sheer volume of data makes threat detection inordinately difficult for individuals, small businesses, and even the largest companies. That’s why Pyrra is so important. Not only can it help individuals, organizations, and businesses identify threats today, but there are many underserved markets where Pyrra’s technology can be deployed in the future. An exciting and disruptive company, Pyrra is valuable for a broad array of stakeholders.”
— Thomas Thurston, Senior Advisor to Ducera and a data scientist
“We’re proud that Human Rights First’s Innovation Lab fostered the development of a technology-driven tool that is meeting the challenge of online extremism. Protection from violent threats, hateful language, and disinformation are critical to human rights, and Pyrra’s tools allow their users to understand and prevent those abuses in new and important ways.”
— Mike Breen, President and CEO of Human Rights First
“This funding round demonstrates the growing need for innovative technologies to tackle these emerging threats. We are moving fast to stay one step ahead of the aggressors, and this capital will ensure we can build the technological solutions our customers need to stay safe. We are grateful for the support we have received from our investors, and deeply appreciate their partnership as we seek to scale our business.”
— Dr. Welton Chang, Pyrra’s Chief Executive Officer
