The Innovators: Two Hat Security creates safe havens on the internet

The Kelowna-based web content moderator was recognized by the World Economic Forum in 2020.

Credit: Two Hat Security

Two Hat founder Chris Priebe

The Kelowna-based web content moderator was recognized by the World Economic Forum in 2020

Our Innovators series highlights just a few of the trailblazing companies that are helping move this province—and the world—forward in challenging times.

Take the perennial threats of cyberbullying, terrorist recruitment and child pornography, layer in political polarization, mass protest and foreign meddling in a U.S. election year, and top it off with a pandemic that has shut down parts of the economy, confined people to their homes and stoked conspiracy theories, and the Internet became a very scary place in 2020. That may have had something to do with why the World Economic Forum chose Kelowna-based Two Hat Security as one of 100 global Technology Pioneers last year.

One of the world’s largest moderators of web content, Two Hat screens 100 billion messages a month–up from 30 billion pre-COVID–for dangerous and inappropriate content on behalf of clients such as gaming, education, live streaming and messaging providers (Activision, Hatch, Kidzworld, MovieStar Planet and Rovio, among others). It’s a never-ending task as malevolent actors keep finding new ways into these gated spaces.

As part of the WEF nod, Two Hat founder and executive chair Chris Priebe (whose brother Lance co-founded children’s game space Club Penguin, acquired by Disney Interactive Studios in 2007 for US$350 million) now sits on a committee dedicated to combating misinformation and hate online. “For me, it’s an opportunity to work with other minds more brilliant than my own on how to solve these very difficult problems,” Priebe says.