A company with deep ties to Israeli intelligence oversees cyber security across more than seventy US government agencies, including the Department of Defense and Homeland Security.

Axonius was founded by former spies in Israel's Unit 8200 and its software, which allows an operator 'visibility and control over all types and number of devices,' collects and analyses the digital data of millions of US federal employees.

Sysman left the IDF in 2014 after five years and set up a cyber hacking outfit, while Shur and Bartov stayed on until 2017, a period which encompassed Israel's 2014 war of aggression against Gaza, during which the IDF murdered more than two thousand Palestinian civilians.

Axonius was established with curious speed. After leaving the IDF in 2017, Shur and Bartov teamed back up with Sysman and immediately received $4 million in seed funding from Yoav Leitersdorf, a San Francisco-based Israeli-American and fellow Unit 8200 veteran, to start Axonius. Leitersdorf, the managing partner at US-Israeli venture capital firm YL Ventures, is a prolific early-stage investor in Unit 8200 cyber start-ups.

The same year Sysman, Shur and Bartov also received millions in seed financing from Israeli firm Vertex Ventures which is run by veterans of Israel's spy units. Tami Bronner, a partner at Vertex, spent four years in Israeli military intelligence.

Following this early financing from investors close to Israel's intelligence establishment, the company went on to receive hundreds of millions in investment from a network of US venture capital firms with intelligence links to Israel.

These include Palo Alto-based Accel Partners, which has invested in more than thirty Israeli tech companies, including another Unit 8200 cyber spin-out, Oasis. Nir Blumberger, an Israeli who served in the IDF, was recruited by Accel from Facebook to open its Tel Aviv office in 2016.

Other Axonius backers include San Francisco-headquartered Bessemer Venture Partners which employs former Israeli intelligence operatives in a Tel Aviv office led by Adam Fisher. An American who emigrated to Israel in 1998, Fisher has acted as an intermediary between Zionists in Silicon Valley and the IDF, and during the genocide gave a presentation on how Israel can win the online war. Israeli Amit Karp, a partner at Bessemer Ventures and another former Israeli intelligence officer, sits on the Axonius board.