Data is an ever-growing commodity, and data brokers are increasingly becoming an issue due to the vast amounts of personal information they collect. Even opting out is difficult, with hundreds of individual sites to do this on. This is why Optery was created, to help make the process easier. Optery recently grew their seed funding to $2.7 million to move from data broker opt-outs to a personal info platform.
The CEO and Co-founder that began the idea, Lawrence Gentilello, pitched his idea at the Disrupt Showcase Stage last September. His idea caught the attention of many as it moved beyond existing services like DeleteMe and PrivacyBee. They offered a solution that allowed users to sign up for free and receive a report of the data brokers his/her personal information was found on with screenshots of the info, as well as instructions and deep links on how to opt out.
Optery’s subscription plan is to have an automated opt-out function and have a constant surveillance on the data. This is an essential service for those who are victims of domestic violence, as they need to delete any evidence of their existence to keep themselves safe. In comparison to Yael’s list, Optery caught almost 50 more data brokers.
Since the number of data brokers is too large and their opt-out rules differ drastically, they created a patented internal search engine and crawler to locate and delete any trace of personal data. This helps with the goal of giving consumers the ability to dictate the type of data they can share to companies and how they can use the data. The funding raised helps them to build out their data management platform to make this goal a reality.
Optery is backed by venture capitalists such as Y Combinator, TRAC, Soma Capital, Pioneer Fund, Goodwater Capital, and Global Founders Capital. With the help of these companies, Optery is making great strides to protect human’s personal data as well as make it easier for them to manage.
Optery’s CEO, Lawrence Gentilello, has a clear goal to have this company play an essential role in the data economy. His team has created a platform that ensures that people can protect their personal information, give out their data at their discretion, and stay afloat in this ever-evolving digital age.
