EZShield unveils new name as combined company with IdentityForce

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EZShield and IdentityForce will be combined under a new name — Sontiq — the two cybersecurity companies announced Wednesday.

Maryland-based EZShield acquired the Massachusetts-based Identity Force last year. The new combined company will be based in Nottingham, Maryland.

“Sontiq is a natural evolution of our two companies, EZShield and IdentityForce,” Dale Dabbs, the company’s president and CEO, said in a statement. “Today, we are excited to launch as Sontiq and we are committed to defending consumers and businesses against cyber threats and identity thieves by providing the latest in product innovation and service excellence.”

EZShield focuses on digital identity theft protection and mobile cybersecurity while IdentityForce focuses on personal information security. The companies have a combined 30 years of experience in the market.

EZShield was owned by investment firm Wicks before it acquired IdentityForce. Wicks is now the majority shareholder of Sontiq.

The combination of the companies, executives believe, makes it a stronger company that can serve people and businesses of different sizes.

“Uniting our brands under Sontiq speaks to the evolution of the company and the breadth of the markets we are able to serve,” Daniel L. Black, managing partner at Wicks, said in a statement. “We have successfully introduced a number of new products and services during the past two years to outpace the rapidly changing ID theft environment.”

Identity protection and responding to identity theft is a large and growing market.

There were 16.7 million victims of identity fraud in 2017, according to a report from Javelin Strategy and Research. That represented a record high number.

Also in 2017, more than 30% of American consumers were notified that their data could have been exposed in a breach.

That all resulted in nearly $17 billion worth of theft. 

Last year the Maryland Office of the Attorney General received 1,067 breach notices, required to be sent to affected consumers and the attorney general’s office whenever data could have been compromised. Already this year the office has posted 529 notices of breaches affecting more than 100,000 Marylanders.

Sontiq hopes the combined resources of EZShield and IdentityForce helps it stay ahead in the field.

“Our smarter, stronger and more integrated approach is built for the speed and volume of modern information-sharing, an approach we call Sontiq’s Intelligent Identity Security,” Dabbs said.

Since EZShield acquired IdentityForce last August, the company has released several new products, including mobile products and products for small businesses.

The company also explained Wednesday why it chose the name Sontiq. It comes from the Latin word “sonticus” which means critical or serious.

“The Sontiq name acknowledges the transformation in the business that we envisioned when we initially invested in EZShield, and then expanded further with the IdentityForce acquisition,” Black said.