StateUp 21 member Cyan Forensics has just announced a £5 million Series A funding round led by Par Equity. This brings Cyan’s total funding to over £8 million. Here’s what you need to know.

What’s interesting about Cyan Forensics?

• Cyan Forensics offers tools to help police forces analyse data from seized computers and online sources. This helps public safety departments uncover and combat crime committed online.
• Cyan’s software, which the UK Home Office describes as “game-changing,” allows public safety professionals to scan for content such as illegal images of children and terrorist handbooks.
• As governments increasingly seek to hold technology platform companies to account for failing to proactively remove harmful content, they may become an increasingly captive market for Cyan Forensics alongside its government contracts.

What does this funding mean for Cyan?

• Cyan reports that this round of funding will help accelerate their global growth plan over the next two years. CEO Ian Stevenson said that the Cyan team “will double in size during each of the next two years to support this growth.”
• The startup plans to focus on its Cyan Protect product, which helps social media platforms, messaging, and cloud content sharing companies find and block child abuse and terrorist content.
• The UK Government’s Online Harms White Paper, published in December 2020 ahead of a likely bill, affirms a commitment to protecting citizens from digital crime. Policy attention may prove a boon for safety tech.

To learn more, read our full StateUp 21 profile of Cyan Forensics here.