ID Verification Platform Payfone Raises $100M

ID verification firm Payfone has completed a $100 million funding round which the company says it will use for strengthening machine learning and building a new consortium to help secure digital transactions, the press release says.

The round was led by funds advised by Apax Digital, the growth equity team of Apax Partners.

Other contributors included new investors Sandbox Insurtech Ventures and Ralph de la Vega, the former Vice Chairman of AT&T. Existing investors MassMutual Ventures, Synchrony, Blue Venture Fund, Wellington Management LLP, and former CEO of LexisNexis Andrew Prozes also chipped in, the press release says.

Payfone has been working with onboarding for health care organizations, financial institutions and tech companies to implement new authentication and security measures, and is able to detect fraud calls and other risks while removing cumbersome processes for legitimate calls.

Payfone CEO Rodger Desai said the company is working with mobile technology that has become a cornerstone of human life.

“The mobile phone is rapidly becoming the secure passport for navigating our digital lives,” Desai said, according to the release. “With one in three U.S. consumers already authenticated by Payfone, this investment accelerates our ability to set the standard for the authentication process. As we build out a cross-industry consortium, more enterprises will be able to access Payfone’s real-time fraud and risk signals to prevent account takeovers while passing more transactions.”

Following the funding round, Apax Digital principal Zach Fuchs and managing partner Daniel O’Keefe will join the Payfone board of directors, the press release says.

This round comes on the heels of another funding round last year, in which Payfone received $24 million. That round, led by TransUnion, saw the two companies partnering to bolster the ID verification services and help with identifying fraud and instantly verifying customers. The partnership also boosted the company’s ability to fight cyberattacks.