An Antivirus for Facebook! secure.me provides Security with Apps and Social Networks

Tuesday September 18, 2012 , 5 min Read

secure.me is a privacy protection company dedicated to making the use of social networks and apps a safe experience for all. Their unique security technology works like an antivirus solution, for Facebook. Today, secure.me is the number 1 Facebook security app, with 100,000 daily active users of all ages in more than 100 countries and ten different languages.secure.me is a cloud service connected to Facebook, the center of most social online lives. Sophisticated algorithms analyze and draw attention to actions on Facebook that could hurt your privacy, security and reputation. secure.me’s Privacy Control monitors your personal and sensitive data to protect your privacy, while providing simple and easy actions that you can take to secure yourself. secure.me recommends how to use privacy settings and permissions so you are able to share at the level you are comfortable with.

“In 2007, my co-founder Christian Sigl and I recognized that with the rapidly growing quantities of personal data online, there will be a need for everybody to protect their social online-lives. We launched our first online reputation platform in 2007, based on proven research and content analysis technology. In 2009, we launched secure.me,” says co-founder & CEO, Mario Grobholz.

secure.me has currently a 20 member team, with headquarters in Munich, Germany, and an office in San Francisco, USA. Christian leads the San Francisco office and is the driving force behind the strategic platform development of secure.me’s cloud-based solution. The experience and network that Mario has built at corporations such as Telefonica, Télévision Française 1, United Internet and in the start-up field has empowered him to transfer their vision from an idea to a leading solution in the market. Christian works hand in hand with the product management, headed by Philipp Strobel, who formerly worked with Apple for 10 years. His experience with Apple is the key for secure.me’s web and mobile development. Benjamin Hüttinger has been leading the product development since day 1 and has a history of developing groundbreaking products, and has remarkable skills in creating sharp software architecture. On the sales, marketing and communications side, an international presence is very necessary. secure.me recently hired Arun Varma for its sales and marketing efforts; Arun has previously worked with Google, holds an MBA from HULT in Boston, USA, and is originally from India. His presence in the company helps it immensely when it comes to understand the Indian market and culture. Marina Ziegler is in charge of the global communications, and is working from San Francisco.

Features

Users will be warned as soon as a new app is connecting with their Facebook profile, whether it’s on Facebook or somewhere on the Web while browsing. Users will also get the full view on their apps’ data collection and activities by accessing the App Security Network, where they can enter any app they use. To create App Advisor, they have analyzed app activities of 50 million Facebook users and more than 500,000 apps.secure.me is based on a freemium model. The premium version is currently available in the German speaking markets and will be rolled out globally.

With almost 50 million Facebook users and soon growing to become the largest Facebook market in the world secure.me has a special focus on India. Under the leadership of their marketing head Arun Varma, they are exploring partnership opportunities to reach out to Indian users. **Indian users already sense a huge interest in the products, especially in specific segments like women who have great privacy concerns**. Most often they are not comfortable talking about it, but more than happy to install a tool that can protect them from privacy violations. India also has a huge gaming market and most often when signing on a gaming app, users do not know what information they part with. The App Advisor has a browser extension which warns users if they are potentially overexposed.

“We know that India has had an incredible track record of churning out entrepreneurial leaders like NR Narayanmurthy and Azim Premji and has shown influential dominance in sectors like IT, power and telecom. With more organized efforts in building support infrastructure, channeling seed investments and most importantly with the government bringing in legislations in favor of young entrepreneurs, we see India becoming one of the largest breeding grounds for entrepreneurs,” says Mario, commenting on the view that the Indian startup eco-system projects to the outside world.

Today, secure.me has users in more than 100 countries in ten different languages. Their top markets so far are the US, UK, and Germany. Facebook is currently seeing huge growth in Brazil and India, as well as in other Latin American markets. These are markets they’re looking into, as well.

The biggest challenge for secure.me is to educate the users about the potential threat they have when using social applications or when simply being a Facebook user. From apps that compromise personal information to photos that could lead to reputation issues, an individual’s personal information is at risk every day. They are planning to build active synergies around partnerships to optimize distribution in a large market like India.Additionally, as a European company they are learning cross-cultural adaptations and they hope that, with Arun’s help, they will master the art soon!

This Anti-virus for Facebook, secure.me, is now on YourStory Pages!

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