Why we invested in Innerworks
By Cat McDonald, Partner
Posted
We’re entering a world where AI – including agents, bots and deepfakes – is changing the internet, very drastically. The boundary between who is human and who is not is becoming harder to define by the day. Fraud attempts by deepfakes having increased by over 2,000% since 2022. As a result, we need “proof of human” infrastructure as fundamental as SSL or single sign-on.
That’s where Innerworks comes in.
Innerworks is building an adaptive security platform that can distinguish between real users and sophisticated AI-generated threats in real time. Unlike legacy fraud tools that search for known patterns or obvious red flags, Innerworks spots synthetic behaviour designed to look legitimate. Think bots completing onboarding flows or automated fraud mimicking human sessions.
At AlbionVC, we invest in the infrastructure that will make the digital economy safe, usable and scalable – and Innerworks is one of the most compelling foundations we’ve seen for this next era of the internet.
A New Category: Synthetic Threat Intelligence
Innerworks has created the first Synthetic Threat Intelligence platform – an adaptive system that continuously learns, evolves and outpaces the development of AI-powered fraud. The system works by layering multiple data signals – from digital body language to device hardware and network characteristics – in a cascading model that builds a unique behavioural fingerprint for each user in real time. At its core is RedTeam: a decentralised network of ethical hackers and AI agents that attack the system from the outside, strengthening it from within.
The results are striking – Innerworks has surpassed every incumbent in detection accuracy, setting a new benchmark for the category. It integrates invisibly with just a few lines of code, works across mobile and web apps, and adds no friction for end users. Whether defending sign-in flows or high-risk interactions like payments, Innerworks delivers industrial-grade protection without 2FA or reCAPTCHA interruptions.
Crypto: The First Battleground
The first and most urgent use case for Innerworks is in financial services and crypto, where fraud is relentless, adversaries are highly motivated, and attack surfaces are expansive. Almost $200 billion was lost to bot-related attacks in 2024 alone.
Crypto, in particular, is a breeding ground for bot-driven abuse. It’s decentralised, always-on, and often lightly regulated. This makes it an ideal playground for attackers targeting airdrops, wallet takeovers, cross-platform arbitrage, or identity spoofing.
To succeed in crypto, security systems must learn and adapt faster than the threats they’re defending against. Innerworks’ ability to operate in this environment – and to do so with early traction from names like Crypto.com and ZeroShadow – shows the robustness of the platform and its potential for broader adoption.
Our Thesis: Securing the Digital Fabric
At AlbionVC, we believe that resilient, intelligent infrastructure for identity and risk is an existential problem to solve. As automation, digital finance and AI converge, the systems underpinning our economy need to be both scalable and secure.
This belief underpins our investments in Quantexa, which powers real-time entity resolution and decision intelligence for global banks; Elliptic, the leading blockchain analytics platform for crypto compliance; Egress, protecting sensitive communications from targeted attacks and insider threats; and Labrys, enabling secure communication and payments in highly sensitive environments.
These companies support the financial systems, and societies, most critical operations. Innerworks is a natural extension of this thesis, providing a core identity layer for an internet increasingly flooded with synthetic behaviour.
Backing the Right Team
Innerworks is led by Oliver Quie. Oli brings deep intellectual range and commercial intuition. He’s building a team, a culture and a product that are already attracting top-tier customers and investors, and he does so with humility and tenacity that stand out even among the best founders we’ve met.
He’s joined by Oscar Hayek, a cybersecurity and machine learning expert who previously worked on national security programmes for the Australian government, and Tom Ryan, a former Cambridge machine learning researcher with deep experience building scalable systems from first principles. Together, they bring an impressive balance of technical depth and product execution.
We’re backing Innerworks alongside a stellar syndicate – including Digital Currency Group, Founders Capital, Cronos Labs, and senior executives from Apple, Coinbase, Checkout.com, Citi and Egress.
Why we’re in
“The internet is changing. Bots are more human than ever – and old security tools weren’t built for this world. We believe Innerworks has the opportunity and ingenuity to become a core part of the solution. We’re incredibly proud to back them from seed – and excited for the journey ahead.”
Cat McDonald, Partner, AlbionVC
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