Deepfaked: Restoring Trust in the Age of AI Impersonation
Join Glasswing Ventures for an evening with Glasswing portfolio CEO and author Aaron Painter, in conversation with Glasswing Founder and Managing Partner Rick Grinnell, to discuss one of the most important challenges of the AI era: how do we know what’s real?
As AI-generated content, deepfakes and digital impersonation become more sophisticated, they are challenging traditional methods of trust and identity verification. In his new book, Deepfaked: Restoring Trust in the Age of AI Impersonation, Aaron explores the growing threat landscape and the technologies and frameworks that can help restore trust online.
The evening will feature a reception with passed hors d'oeuvres, a fireside chat, audience Q&A, and networking with founders, investors, security leaders and technology executives from the Boston innovation ecosystem. Attendees will receive a complimentary copy of Deepfaked while supplies last.
This event is 21+.
About Aaron Painter
Aaron Painter is the CEO of Nametag, the identity verification company that protects organizations from impersonators and AI-generated deepfakes. Leading enterprises use Nametag to prevent fraud, cut support costs and securely verify customers during high-risk interactions. Gartner named Nametag a Visionary in its 2026 Magic Quadrant™ for Identity Verification. Aaron has lived and worked in six countries on four continents and has visited more than 100. That experience shaped his belief that trust is the foundation of every successful relationship and organization, and that it has to be earned differently across cultures.
About Rick Grinnell
Rick Grinnell is Founder and Managing Partner of Glasswing Ventures, which invests in AI-native security and enterprise infrastructure. He has more than 25 years in venture capital and has led investments or served on the boards of companies including Nametag, Black Kite, Allure Security and Trustle. Earlier exits include Resilient Systems (acquired by IBM), EqualLogic (acquired by Dell) and Prelert (acquired by Elastic). Before venture, he held senior marketing and engineering roles at PictureTel and Adero. Rick is active across the Boston innovation ecosystem. He serves on the boards of the Advanced Cyber Security Center and the MIT Sandbox and on the MIT Educational Council, and advises at Harvard Business School’s Rock Center for Entrepreneurship. Business Insider named him one of the Most Important VCs in Boston. He holds BS and MS degrees in Electrical Engineering from MIT and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
About Glasswing Ventures
Glasswing Ventures is a first-capital-in VC firm that has backed AI-native and frontier technology companies shaping the future of enterprise and security markets since 2016. We partner with exceptional founders at inception and stay committed for the long term. Our team pairs deep AI domain expertise with decades of operating experience. A network of 75+ advisors across our Connect and Protect Councils extends that reach, opening doors to enterprise buyers, accelerating revenue and recruiting the talent early companies can’t reach on their own. Our portfolio includes Verusen, Reprise, Iris Finance and Infinity Loop, among others, with exits to Snowflake, Google, Terminus and Oracle.