Blockaid, a Web3 security company based in New York and Tel Aviv, has successfully raised $33 million in funding through a Series A round led by Ribbit Capital and Variant, with participation from Cyberstarts, Sequoia Capital, and Greylock Partners. This significant financial backing is aimed at further developing Blockaid's product, expanding its customer base, and addressing the ongoing security challenges within the Web3 industry.

Founded in 2022 by Ido Ben-Natan and CTO Raz Niv, both alumni of Unit 8200 in the Israel Defense Forces, Blockaid brings a wealth of experience in cybersecurity. The founders, who previously worked as Cyber Security R&D Team Leads at the Office of the Prime Minister of Israel, emphasise Blockaid's unique architecture that continuously improves by ingesting vast amounts of data from scanning, simulating, and validating decentralised applications (dApps) and transactions across the web.

Problems in the Web3 Security Space

In an emailed announcement, Blockaid highlighted the persistent security challenges faced by the Web3 industry, describing them as "never-ending." The company aims to utilise the newly acquired funds to scale its security offerings, enhance its customer base, and build a robust team to effectively combat security threats prevalent in the Web3 space.

Blockaid's security approach involves providing a layer of security that scans transactions from wallets, interacts with dApps or smart contracts, and is compatible with any blockchain network. The company's products, the dApp Scanning Engine and dApp Scanning Sandbox, have been integrated into wallets without additional costs for notable clients such as MetaMask, OpenSea, Rainbow, and Zerion.

Blockaid claims to have scanned an impressive 450 million transactions over the past six months alone. During this period, it successfully prevented 1.2 million malicious transactions, safeguarding approximately $500 million in user funds that might have otherwise been compromised. The company's focus is on providing security tools that address the usability issues and challenges faced by Web3 builders and users.

Web3's Security Landscape and Losses

The funding comes at a time when the Web3 industry is grappling with substantial security challenges. Certik's third-quarter Web3 Security Quarterly Report revealed that losses in Q3 2023 amounted to nearly $700 million across 184 incidents, surpassing the total losses from the first half of the year. These figures underscore the critical need for advanced security measures to protect Web3 projects and applications.

Blockaid has also partnered with prominent names within the Web3 industry, including MetaMask, OpenSea, Rainbow, and Zerion.

Notably, Blockaid has also collaborated with MetaMask and OpenSea to introduce an experimental feature warning users about "known scams." Users opting into this feature could benefit from OpenSea's blocklist and Blockaid's analysis of malicious behaviours.