Russian investors pile cash into a startup that can detect your Photoshop fakery

Flint Capital, a $30 million high-tech investment fund based in Moscow, and FRII, a government-backed $200 million seed and early-stage fund, have invested an undisclosed amount in SMTDP Tech LTD, a St. Petersburg startup that has developed a technology to verify the authenticity of photographs.

Christened the “Picture Manipulation Inspector” (PMI), the solution is intended for use by a range of industries — from insurance, to photojournalism, to advertising, to construction — where “fraud involving photo faking is increasing,” according to the developers.

Clone detection: PMI reveals cloning, copying, or pasting in the image.

SMTDP Tech LTD was founded in 2011 by a group of experts in the areas of business process automation, graphic design, software engineering, and creating algorithms for decision making in conditions of uncertainty and risk.

First tested on faked photo reports archived by insurance companies, the software was completed in late 2012. Insurance companies were among the software company’s first customers.

In 2013, Belkasoft, a Russian provider of solutions for forensic investigations, introduced PMI to its customer base, which consists of 20,000 state experts across the world.

The funds raised by SMTDP Tech LTD will be used to increase its turnover “to several million dollars” and for the startup’s international development.