The identity management sector is booming, with investors pouring over $300 million into two major identity startups within days. Meanwhile, a high-profile iris-scanning initiative has officially launched in the U.S., underscoring how critical identity verification has become in the AI era.
Persona and Veza Lead the Funding Race
San Francisco-based Persona secured a massive $200 million Series D led by Founders Fund and Ribbit Capital. The company builds identity verification tools that help businesses distinguish real humans from bots—a need that’s growing fast as artificial traffic now exceeds human activity online.
Persona says it will use the new capital to refine its tools for an AI-dominated internet, where bots are becoming smarter and harder to detect.
Just two days before Persona’s announcement, Veza, another identity security startup from Silicon Valley, revealed a $108 million Series D round led by New Enterprise Associates. Veza’s mission is to “revolutionize identity security” in the age of agentic AI, where machines operate on behalf of users and generate content with increasing realism.
Both startups emphasize their ability to adapt to the emerging threat landscape, particularly as AI-generated deepfakes, impersonations, and bot activity blur the lines between real and fake users.
Worldcoin Debuts U.S. Rollout of Iris-Scanning Tech
Beyond funding news, the U.S. launch of World—the identity project co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman—has stirred public attention. Formerly known as Worldcoin, the venture is building a biometric identity system using iris scans stored on the blockchain.
Last Thursday, the project opened five U.S. locations where users can have their eyes and faces scanned and encrypted for future authentication. Locations include trendy spots like Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles and even a mall in Nashville.
To date, World has raised $244 million from top firms like Andreessen Horowitz and Blockchain Capital. Its mission is bold: to distinguish humans from AI in a future where the line between them grows increasingly hard to define.
This biometric approach isn’t without controversy, but World’s backers believe it could be a necessary step in establishing trust and accountability online.
The surge in funding is part of a broader trend. In the past year, over a dozen identity startups have secured major rounds, with Crunchbase listing 14 recent examples.
Aura, a Boston-based consumer identity protection company, leads the pack. It has raised more than $660 million, including a $140 million Series G in March. Semperis, an 11-year-old Hoboken-based startup, has pulled in $500 million, including $125 million last summer. Its tools focus on identity threat detection and response.
Other rising names include Reality Defender, a deepfake detection firm from New York, which recently completed a strategic round to expand its anti-impersonation technology.
Even public markets are paying attention. Identity verification firm Okta has seen its stock rise more than 50% over the past six months, while CyberArk, which provides identity security software, is valued around $17 billion.
Identity Spending Expected to Exceed $24B
The market for identity and access management is accelerating fast. According to the Identity Management Institute (IMI), global spending in this area is expected to exceed $24 billion in 2025, up roughly 13% year-over-year.
Key drivers include the widespread shift to remote and hybrid work, increased use of cloud-based services, and the move toward biometric authentication in place of passwords.
Persona and others also point to AI bot traffic as a core challenge. The company projects that by the end of the decade, bots and agents could generate 90% of all online traffic. These entities are evolving, capable of solving CAPTCHAs, mimicking humans, and even acting on behalf of real users.
That level of sophistication presents a threat—but also a huge opportunity for startups that can solve it. As AI grows more powerful, companies that can reliably verify human identity will become mission-critical.
