California-based secretive startup founded by ex-Pentagon employees wants to impede hackers

By VCPOST Staff Reporter

Jan 21, 2014 09:39 PM EST

Former Pentagon employees founded stealthy cybersecurity startup Shape Security wants to impede hackers, according to The Wall Street Journal (WSJ).

Shape has closed $26 million during an early-stage financing round. The company, however, is not disclosing its valuation. The cybersecurity firm is based in Mountain View, California. Its investors include Google Ventures and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. StubHub and Citigroup are among Shape's clients, the report detailed.

Most hackers use infected computers to launch automated attacks against a target. For example, they will set their computers to hit a certain site with useless traffic to the point that it gets overwhelmed and then finally goes down. This is known as a denial-of-service attack. The hackers compete with time until the target figures out that sensitive credit card data have been stolen and gets a new card, the report explained.

Hackers are able to achieve this feat by finding the code behind the website. They construct a program that fill in the gaps in Web forms. Shape tries to stonewall these attacks by using software that constantly scrambles the said code. The website, on the other hand, appears unchanged on a user's browser, WSJ reported.

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