Kerberus

Kerberus is a Web3 security company whose browser extension, Sentinel3, silently scans and blocks phishing sites, malicious smart contracts, and social-engineering attacks in real time before a user's wallet ever connects — operating across more than 1,000 EVM-compatible chains and Solana.

What Kerberus Does

The dominant attack vector in crypto is not code exploits — it is the human element. Phishing pages, impersonator accounts, address-poisoning schemes, and manipulative approval requests combine to drain wallets from users who never intended to take a risk. Kerberus targets this layer: the browser interface between a user and the blockchain.

Sentinel3, the flagship Kerberus product, is a Chromium browser extension (Chrome, Brave, Edge) that runs continuously in the background. When a user navigates to a Web3 site, the extension cross-references it against Kerberus's threat intelligence before any wallet connection occurs. If the site is flagged, the connection is blocked automatically without requiring the user to interpret a warning or make a judgment call. The extension only surfaces alerts when it finds a confirmed threat, keeping friction minimal for legitimate activity.

Beyond site-level blocking, Sentinel3 intercepts at the transaction layer. Before a user signs a transaction, the extension simulates it and shows a plain-English breakdown of expected asset changes — what will leave the wallet, what will arrive, and which permissions are being granted. This pre-signature simulation is one of the most effective defenses against approval-phishing attacks, where users sign transactions whose consequences they do not fully understand.

Key Features

Real-time scam detection is the core primitive. Sentinel3 evaluates both site reputation and on-chain context, with Kerberus claiming a 99.9% detection rate and no reported user losses since the platform launched in January 2023. These figures originate from Kerberus itself and were corroborated by an independent audit in early 2025.

Address poisoning protection guards against a specific attack class where a malicious wallet address is seeded into a user's transaction history to trick them into sending funds to the wrong destination. Sentinel3 flags these poisoned addresses before a transaction is confirmed.

Social Shield extends protection to X (formerly Twitter), scanning for impersonator accounts that mimic known protocols, founders, and influencers — a common vector for fake airdrop and phishing links.

MEV protection routes eligible transactions through a private mempool, reducing exposure to front-running and sandwich attacks.

Transaction coverage insurance ties the product offering together. Sentinel3 Pro users receive up to $30,000 USDC in transaction coverage per event, extendable to 100 ETH, through a partnership with Fairside Network. The coverage activates when Sentinel3 was running and did not flag a threat but the user still suffered a loss — providing a financial backstop against false negatives.

Solana Integration

Kerberus expanded to Solana in February 2025, initially through the Pocket Universe product's integration with Phantom wallet. After Kerberus acquired Pocket Universe in August 2025, Solana scam protection was folded into the unified Sentinel3 platform. The docs list Solana as a supported chain in beta alongside the broader EVM coverage. Given the $250 million estimated in Solana losses in the first half of 2025 (as cited in Kerberus's own research), the timing of that expansion aligned with measurable market demand.

Token

Kerberus has no issued token. The company operates on a freemium subscription model: the base extension is free, and a Pro tier unlocks full transaction coverage and advanced features. No evidence of planned tokenization has been found in public materials.

Security and Audits

In February 2025, Kerberus became the first browser extension to earn the Risk Management Authentication (RMA) certification from VaaSBlock, an independent Web3 security auditor. The VaaSBlock review examined the product's detection capability, business model, and operational claims. Auditors documented a 99.9% scam detection rate and confirmed the zero-loss streak dating to January 2023, describing Kerberus's model as "straightforward" and "transparent."

The product itself is closed-source, consistent with standard commercial security software but distinct from the open-source auditable model of on-chain protocols. There is no independent on-chain verification of the zero-loss claim beyond the VaaSBlock attestation.

Team and History

Kerberus was co-founded in 2022 under the name MintDefense. The company rebranded to Kerberus in April 2024. It is incorporated in Delaware with operational presence in Israel.

Alex Katz, CEO and co-founder, has a background in digital marketing and finance, having served as a global marketing director and COO before founding the company. Katz is the primary public spokesperson and has given interviews to outlets including Metaverse Post and Yahoo Tech on the state of Web3 security.

Danor Cohen, CTO and co-founder, brings 15-plus years in offensive cybersecurity. Cohen previously served as Head of Offensive Security at Salesforce and has been recognized as a top-ten hacker in PayPal's bug bounty program and appears in Dropbox's security hall of fame. His background anchors the technical credibility of the product's detection claims.

The company has grown largely through acquisition rather than traditional venture fundraising, emphasizing profitability through organic user growth rather than equity rounds.

Fire (September 2024): Kerberus acquired Fire, a Web3 security extension originally incubated by venture studio Atomic. Fire's transaction-translation UI was integrated into Sentinel3, and the acquisition was reported to have grown Kerberus's user base roughly 20-fold. The deal was covered by Decrypt and included in SecurityWeek's monthly M&A roundup.

Pocket Universe / Refract Inc. (August 2025): In a seven-figure acquisition, Kerberus acquired Refract Inc., the company behind Pocket Universe, one of the most-recognized Web3 security extensions. Pocket Universe had approximately 200,000 users and over $1 billion in assets under protection at the time. Its backers included Zee Prime Capital, Alliance DAO, and AirTree Ventures. Founders Justin Phu and Nishan Samarasinghe stepped back from daily operations. The deal also brought Ran Neuner — CEO of Onchain Capital and founder of Crypto Banter — on board as a strategic advisor. The combination gave the unified Kerberus platform roughly 250,000 protected users.

Analyst firm Architect Partners contextualized the deal against comparable security acquisitions: Phantom's acquisition of Blowfish and MetaMask's acquisition of Wallet Guard, both at undisclosed but reportedly significant figures.

Ecosystem Position

Kerberus occupies the user-facing security layer of Web3 rather than the protocol or infrastructure layer. Its approach parallels antivirus software in traditional computing: a persistent background service that intercepts threats before they cause harm. The Sentinel3 extension is chain-agnostic by design, which allows it to serve users across EVM chains and Solana without fragmenting its user base by network.

The company's growth-through-acquisition strategy has consolidated several previously independent security extensions — MintDefense, Fire, and Pocket Universe — into a single platform. This consolidation reflects a broader market dynamic in Web3 security where user acquisition is expensive and established trust is more valuable than technical differentiation alone. With 250,000 users, an independent audit on record, and active Solana coverage, Kerberus sits among the more established entries in the browser-side Web3 security category.