For years, “Know Your Customer” checks have become commonplace on the internet, often by sharing a copy of a government-issued ID and selfies to make sure it’s really you, visiting websites and apps, or purchasing certain products.
Today, the Age Verifice Act, the UK, Australia and others in effect in the US, have created an entire industry of ID checking companies accused of granting access to the “adult” web.
However, when I uploaded my identity details and selfies to my company’s servers, I was surprised and feared that this sensitive information could be monetized, lost or stolen in a data breach.
A new startup called Trusources aims to solve some of these privacy and security challenges by performing ageing and identity checks on personal devices without leaving their phones. The company is part of the startup battlefield and will showcase new technology from October 27th to 29 at TechCrunch Surptruty 2025, which operates 29 in Moscone West, San Francisco.
Sanjay Krishnamurthy, founder and chief technology officer of Trusources, is working on WhatsApp’s core crypto engine and tells TechCrunch that he was the first to tackle technology to prevent fraud.
His company developed the Deepfake-Detection app and the “KYC” app. This can be used to check the user’s activity in seconds.
Krishnamurthy says that when a user verifies his identity with Trusources, like most age and ID checking companies, none of that information is uploaded to the server. Instead, Trusources’ technology relies on custom machine learning models burned into apps that detect patterns from existing datasets developed by the company to find Deepfakes and False Idention cards.
TechCrunch Events
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October 27th-29th, 2025
Trusources technology can be integrated with other apps and websites that need to comply with the Aging Act. The technology can also be integrated into a company’s single sign-on service to allow employees to access multiple work apps with a set of credentials.
The app can also create QR codes for real-world use. For example, when you prove that a person’s age enters a bar without giving them a physical copy of the identity document.
Krishnamurthy said his technology will help companies subject to age verification and identity checks to comply with KYC rules, and protect them from the need to collect identity documents issued by people’s governments and store user privacy.
“A few countries require that all apps need to know your age. They don’t want to get IDs from around the world, so they have big problems and there are all sorts of legal implications,” Krishnamursi tells TechCrunch.
Trusources is still in its early days, but stands out as one of the few startups working on identity checks and age verification, but does not undermine a person’s privacy or security.
If you want to hear more about Trusources, as well as dozens of other startups, pitches and listen to guest speakers in four different stages, come and join us at Discrupt, which will be held from October 27th to 29th at San Francisco.
Click here for more information on tickets and prices.
