From teen hacker to Iron Dome researcher, this founder raised $28M to fight AI phishing

从少年黑客到“铁穹”研究员，这位创始人融资 2800 万美元对抗 AI 网络钓鱼

Shay Shwartz knows a lot about email phishing attacks. As a teenager, he made money as a hacker, but after getting caught at age 16, he realized he could use his cyber talents to prevent attacks rather than launch them. He went on to spend about a decade in top-tier cybersecurity roles, leading major projects for Israel’s elite defense and intelligence units, including work connected to the Iron Dome project, before joining Axis, the startup later acquired by HPE. Shay Shwartz 对电子邮件网络钓鱼攻击了如指掌。青少年时期，他曾通过黑客行为获利，但在 16 岁被捕后，他意识到自己可以将网络天赋用于防御而非攻击。此后，他在顶级网络安全岗位上工作了约十年，为以色列精锐国防和情报部门领导了多个重大项目（包括与“铁穹”防御系统相关的项目），随后加入了后来被 HPE 收购的初创公司 Axis。

All along, he had been itching to launch his own startup, and two years ago, he finally took the plunge. His startup Ocean, an agentic email security platform built to fight AI-powered attacks, just emerged from stealth mode with $28 million in total funding. The round was led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, with participation from Picture Capital and Cerca Partners. High-profile angel investors also joined the round, including Wiz co-founder and CEO Assaf Rappaport, as well as Yevgeny Dibrov and Nadir Izrael, the co-founders of Armis, which recently sold to ServiceNow for $7.75 billion. 他一直渴望创办自己的公司，两年前，他终于付诸行动。他的初创公司 Ocean 是一个旨在对抗 AI 驱动攻击的代理式电子邮件安全平台，该公司刚刚结束隐身模式，并获得了总计 2800 万美元的融资。本轮融资由 Lightspeed Venture Partners 领投，Picture Capital 和 Cerca Partners 跟投。多位知名天使投资人也参与了本轮融资，包括 Wiz 联合创始人兼 CEO Assaf Rappaport，以及 Armis 的联合创始人 Yevgeny Dibrov 和 Nadir Izrael（Armis 最近以 77.5 亿美元的价格被 ServiceNow 收购）。

While established vendors like Proofpoint and Mimecast, along with newer players like Abnormal Security, help detect standard phishing attacks, Shwartz (pictured right next to co-founder and CTO Oran Moyal) argues that AI requires a different defensive approach. In the past, only highly sophisticated hackers could pull off spear-phishing due to the sheer amount of time, research, and manual labor needed to launch targeted attacks. 虽然 Proofpoint 和 Mimecast 等老牌供应商以及 Abnormal Security 等新兴厂商能够帮助检测标准的网络钓鱼攻击，但 Shwartz（右侧照片中与联合创始人兼 CTO Oran Moyal 并肩者）认为，AI 需要一种不同的防御方法。过去，由于发动定向攻击需要耗费大量的时间、研究和人工，只有技术高超的黑客才能实施鱼叉式网络钓鱼。

“AI just made the entire process automatic, so the scale is much, much bigger now,” Shwartz told TechCrunch. “I can instruct LLM to go and understand exactly who you are, harvest large amount of public information, and create those phishing attacks very targeted against you.” “AI 让整个过程实现了自动化，因此现在的规模要大得多，”Shwartz 在接受 TechCrunch 采访时表示。“我可以指示大语言模型（LLM）去精准了解你是谁，收集大量公开信息，并针对你创建极具针对性的网络钓鱼攻击。”

Ocean claims its AI can thoroughly analyze the context of every incoming email to detect fraud and impersonation attempts. The startup is already reviewing billions of emails each month for customers including Kayak, Kingston Technology, and Headspace. Shwartz said Ocean built a small language model tailored to quickly analyze emails, understand the sender’s intent, and evaluate it against the user’s specific organizational context. Ocean 声称其 AI 可以彻底分析每封入站邮件的上下文，以检测欺诈和冒充企图。目前，该公司每月为 Kayak、Kingston Technology 和 Headspace 等客户审查数十亿封邮件。Shwartz 表示，Ocean 构建了一个小型语言模型，专门用于快速分析邮件、理解发件人意图，并根据用户特定的组织背景进行评估。

“This is like having a guard in every door,” Shwartz said. “This is how we make the inbox a safe place with high hygiene.” “这就像在每一扇门后都安排了一名守卫，”Shwartz 说道。“这就是我们如何让收件箱变得安全且高度清洁的方法。”