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In 2006, as Blake Hall was headed into Mosul, Iraq for a 15-month tour of duty, the army converted his recon platoon into a kill-capture unit and tasked them with targeting senior al-Qaeda leadership. Oftentimes, Hall says, that meant trying to take down vehicle bomb networks—a mission which, in addition to protecting Iraqi civilians, gave him first-hand insight into how bad actors leverage telecommunications technologies. “Our job was … usually to get to a phone and a terrorist before a car bomb went off in a marketplace somewhere, so [I] learned a ton about how telecom networks work and how bad guys behave differently than normal people,” the former reconnaissance platoon leader recalls. “You’re probably not swapping your SIM card, and changing your phone and your device, and using couriers to mask your biometrics and things like that. [But] those are all things that bad guys do.” After leaving active service, Hall enrolled at Harvard Business School. But his experience with terrorist telecommunications stuck with him and eventually informed the fraud prevention work of the startup he founded during school, ID.me. The identity verification company was a product of Hall’s military service in more ways than one. It gave him a sense of purpose he felt had been missing after he left active duty, and its early focus on helping veterans access their veteran benefits was a fitting match for his own veteran status. “On Veterans Day, you would have veterans sharing their separation paperwork, which had their social security number on it, to get a free Bloomin’ Onion” at Outback Steakhouse, says Hall, the company’s CEO. “They’re showing their social to a stranger to get a fried vegetable, and I was just like, ‘Man, that’s a bad trade. There’s got to be a better way.’” The solution was a digital wallet that helps people—initially veterans, now all Americans—prove that they are who they say they are, including when it comes to accessing government programs and consumer discounts, while controlling which third parties can access their data and blocking attempts at identity theft and fraud. Now a $2 billion unicorn and a repeat Inc. 5000 honoree, ID.me has grown to impressive scale over the years: It counts over 18 million veterans and service members among its user base (as well as corporate partners ranging from Apple and YouTube to BMW, Tesla, and Ford) and has expanded its services to support groups such as students, teachers, and first responders, as well as users of many state and federal benefit services including the Internal Revenue Service and the Social Security Administration. That growth has been fueled in part by his relentless pursuit of outside funding, including both venture capital and government grants that have helped finance this second act of Hall’s long career fighting bad guys. Here’s how he did it. Friends and Family: $120,000 in mid-2010
