Scamnetic uses advanced AI to protect individuals and businesses from digital fraud by detecting and scoring the risk of inbound communications and transactions in real-time. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Scamnetic CEO Al Pascual to learn more.
Al Pascual’s Background
Could you tell me more about your background? Pascual said:
“Happy to. I grew up in NYC as the son of two NYPD detectives, so I’ve been raised with a certain perspective on crime prevention. Suffice it to say that it has been reflected in my career as I’ve been in the broader fraud and security space for more than 20 years. I started my career in financial services, working as a fraud investigator for organizations such as HSBC and Goldman Sachs. From there, I became an industry analyst at the firm Javelin (which authors the longest-running annual study on consumer identity fraud), where I eventually rose to the executive leadership team, serving as Head of Fraud & Security and the company’s Research Director. After leaving Javelin, I co-founded Breach Clarity, a company focused on the impact of data breaches on consumers. That company was eventually acquired by TransUnion.”
Formation Of The Company
How did the idea for the company come together? Pascual shared:
“After I transitioned to TransUnion, my co-founder and I began to hear how serious a problem scams were becoming. After realizing there was a lack of solutions in the market, we decided this was something we wanted to help solve. That was the start, but after digging in and hearing all of the stories, it became abundantly clear where we needed to focus from a product perspective – and that was on empowering consumers to prevent victimization in the first place.”
Favorite Memory
What has been your favorite memory working for the company so far? Pascual reflected:
“My favorite memory so far was having our first in-person annual meeting. The company has grown tremendously over the last few years, and seeing all these people come together with the same mission and passion has been incredibly validating – not to mention exciting, as I imagine how much more we will be able to do to keep people safe given our size.”
Core Products
What are the company’s core products and features? Pascual explained:
“Scamnetics core products are:
- Scan & Score, which automatically scans emails, texts, DMs, videos, QR codes, and even websites to help users immediately identify scam attempts.
- IDeveryone, which is the first peer-to-peer identity proofing tool. Users can verify and authenticate anyone. Scams are inherently an identity issue – if we knew we were sending money to a scammer, we wouldn’t – which is something we empower our users to understand.
- Scam Intervention, powered by experts trained to help users determine whether they are involved in a scam and to provide victim services should things get bad. It is our way of being there for them, no matter what.”
Challenges Faced
Have you faced any challenges in your sector of work recently? Pascual acknowledged:
“Our greatest challenge so far is typical for companies that innovate. When you build something innovative, it takes time to help potential buyers understand how it fits into their own businesses. Aiding customers in understanding how adoption applies to them is crucial, as we are a B2B2C company that sells through partners only. We don’t replace any existing solution, as what we do is net new. But the reception has been great; new clients are now benefiting from lessons learned during early implementations, and we are growing our user base extremely quickly.”
Evolution Of The Company’s Technology
How has the company’s technology evolved since launching? Pascual noted:
“We learned that making the solution easy to use and trustworthy was the two most important things we could do to drive sales and adoption. In only a couple of years, the product is light-years ahead of where we were.”
Significant Milestones
What have been some of the company’s most significant milestones? Pascual cited:
“Some of our most significant milestones have been establishing partnerships with companies like Sigma Loyalty – the largest identity protection provider in Canada – as well as with MasterCard, along with closing our Series A, where we raised $13 million (in Q2 2025).
- Can you share any specific customer success stories?
- Early on, we had a financial institution test the solution without some of the automation we provide. The exclusion on their part was intentional as they were wary of how users would respond. Shortly after their early user tests, they learned that the very automation they had left out was the top capability those same users wished they had during the tests. We have since seen adoption of our Scan & Score automation – which we call AutoScan – climb to 97% among users at that institution. That means that 97% of those customers now have automatic protection from scams.
Funding/Revenue
Are you able to discuss funding and/or revenue metrics? Pascual revealed:
“Since our inception, we have raised approximately $16 million.”
Total Addressable Market (TAM)
What total addressable market (TAM) size is the company pursuing? Pascual assessed:
“We believe the TAM comprises two parts: consumer security ($43 billion) and payment fraud prevention ($64 billion). The former is what we are tackling with our original solution suite called KnowScam (which includes Scan & Score, IDeveryone, and Scam Intervention). The latter is a massive area of opportunity that we can now address with a new product called PayVerify, based on our patented IDeveryone technology, which designed to help institutions and their customers identify any counterparty in a transaction.”
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates the company from its competition? Pascual affirmed:
“We differentiate ourselves based on offering capabilities no one else does – specifically, IDeveryone – and in that we use our own machine learning. In contrast, competitors with similar solutions (to Scan & Score) all use generative AI, which creates outsized privacy and security risks, not to mention accuracy issues.”
Future Company Goals
What are some of the company’s future goals? Pascual emphasized:
“This year, we plan to expand rapidly in the financial payment fraud prevention and security space and to begin bringing our solution to even more markets than we do today. For reference, we are live today with clients in the US, Canada, and Australia.”
