A $4.5 million seed round was raised by Harpie, an on-chain firewall provider, to shield consumers from cryptocurrency theft. According to a company release on Monday, Dragonfly Capital led the round. Coinbase Ventures and OpenSea also participated. Secure Ethereum Wallets Users By enabling users to create a “trusted network” of apps and individuals to whom they want to transmit tokens, the business hopes to secure those who use Ethereum wallets. Any transaction made outside of this network will be considered fraudulent and prevented. As per Chainalysis’ August report, through July 2022, nearly $1.9 billion worth of crypto was stolen through hacks of services, as opposed to just under $1.2 billion in 2021. Strategy for Preventing Attacks Noah and Daniel Chong co-founded Harpie to tackle the rise in theft. Harpie documents that among the crypto thefts it could stop include frontend attacks, phishing attempts, phony website frauds, and unintentional transfers. “With the majority of theft happening on Ethereum, it only makes sense to start here and expand to other chains as the need arises,” said Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital, in the release. The company’s statement notes that it will use the funds raised to expand its customer base and operations to include institutional investors and group treasuries. Based on Harpie’s whitepaper, the startup’s business plan involves levying a 7% charge on each recovered ass...
