Virtru Raises $50M Series D, Valuation Doubles to $500M

Virtru Inc., a Washington, D.C.-based data security startup founded in 2012 by John and Will Ackerly, has raised $50 million in a Series D funding round led by Iconiq Capital, doubling its valuation to $500 million. The company specializes in data-centric security through its open standard Trusted Data Format (TDF), developed by co-founder Will Ackerly during his NSA tenure, which embeds security controls directly into data files to ensure persistent protection as data moves across networks. Virtru’s technology is trusted by over 6,000 organizations, including the U.S. Department of Defense, JPMorgan Chase, Capital One, Equifax, and Salesforce, and is recognized as a standard for securing sensitive national defense and intelligence data. The new funding will help Virtru address growing security challenges posed by artificial intelligence, particularly in managing unstructured data that flows dynamically across public and private sectors. CEO John Ackerly emphasized the company’s long-term vision to secure all data everywhere and highlighted the critical importance of granular, data-centric security in the evolving AI-driven digital landscape. Virtru offers multiple products including integrations with Google Workspace and Microsoft 365, enabling encryption for emails and files, and providing centralized control to grant or revoke access, set expiration dates, and monitor file usage.