Internet security company Dasient was acquired by social networking service Twitter on Monday for an undisclosed amount, granting backers including corporate venturing unit Google Ventures an exit.
Google led Dasient’s series A round in February 2011, which also saw investment from investment firm Radar Partners and venture capital firms Floodgate and Benhamou Global Ventures. The latter two previously contributed to Dasient’s $2m seed round in February 2009.
Founded in the US in 2008 by ex-Google employees Neil Daswani, Ameet Ranadive and Shariq Rizvi, Dasient provided a security platform that guards against malware, scanning websites and web addresses for harmful content. The service will no longer be provided for outside customers but will instead be folded into Twitter’s real-time social networking service.
Dasient is the sixth web startup to be acquired by Twitter in as many months, a group that also includes online security company Whisper Systems. Twitter’s acquisition strategy appears to be based primarily around small firms that work in online security, social advertising and content sharing.