DC Inno Beat 6/25: OPM Fail, Brazen Raises $4.7M, Cybrary Helps Refugees and NEA Cashes In

By Chris Bing

June 25, 2015, 01:42pm EDT

The kitchen features retractable doors to block out noise.

Here's a short video I took at Startup Grind, yesterday, where Va. Governor Terry McAuliffe spoke about making Virginia the "cyber capital"...

...Lets Get Started

The Big One

Chris: What do you do when you’re facing immense scrutiny and the ledge is coming closer with every breath you take? … You double down, obviously. Or at least that’s what OPM Director Katherine Archuleta did yesterday when she stood before a bevy of pale faces on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Archuleta outright rejected recent reports that said the total number of exposed records was an astonishing 18M — each file representative of data stolen from individual federal employees. She remained stone-faced, following in stride with her first performance with the committee, and repeatedly responded in some form, “I do not want to be in a position of providing you and the affected individuals with potentially inaccurate data.”

That all being said, you have to feel somewhat sorry for Archulete; OPM’s security was entirely underfunded and mostly contracted out, primarily to KeyPoint Government Solutions. The heat has been undeniable strong, as nearly every lawmaker that took the mic blasted Archuleta, yesterday, about her management of OPM. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell called it, and I quote, "world-class buck-passing.” The real question now seems to be whether all 32M current/former federal records in the database were compromised. To which Archuleta responded with a statement that you may recognize…

Eric: Archuleta is responsible but that doesn't mean she could have prevented the hack from happening, especially with the limited resources she had. Let's hope Congress understands the lesson that agencies need the resources to stop hackers, instead of just focusing on blame.

Making Moves

Chris: Brazen, the Arlington-based software platform for real-time messaging and collaborations, has raised $4.7M in a funding round led by Osage Venture Partners. The money will be used to fund a rebranding effort and to expand product offerings beyond career-based help. The company’s product is sort of like a fusion between Slack, Go2Meeting and a jobs board site, where employers can directly and quickly contact prospective employees. Whats the deal, Eric?

Eric: Brazen offers a popular product and could have the clientele to really leverage the new funding into taking the company to the next level. That said, the very popularity of the kind of product it offers means that there will be intense competition and Brazen will have to, well, brazen it out somehow.

Chris: Unbiased opinion here… but this is an awesome, ‘feel good’ story: Cybrary, a local cybersecurity and IT training company, has now partnered with Cornerstone to providecomputer literacy and IT educational courses to female refugees that call the D.C.-area their shelter from persecution. The all women-led and participated course will help provide tech skills to refugees from Iraq, Burma and Afghanistan, among other countries. For the full story about what’s going on and how you can get involved, just read our full article

Eric: Going big on cybersecurity today, Chris? I think the real takeaway is that there is so much money and need for good cybersecurity that it's going to be a bonanza for any startup with a clever take on how to approach digital security needs.

Chris: NEA, the Washington, D.C.-based mega-giant, global venture capital firm, has secured a board seat on San Fransisco-based startup HackerOne’s board via a $25M Series B round that it lead. HackerOne are the developers of a quickly growing cybersecurity employment marketplace where companies can hire hackers to find vulnerabilities in their systems. It’s a potential revolutionary platform that benefits from cybersecurity’s current fascination on threat information sharing. Here’s the full story behind all the players pushing cash into it

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