PhishTested started with three dads: Ken Panco, Chad Durling, and Michael Sneddon. Our daughters became close friends at daycare, and what began as playdates and casual hangouts quickly turned into a real friendship among us too. Like a lot of parents, we spent plenty of time talking about family, parenting, technology, and the challenges that come with raising kids in a world that keeps changing faster every year.
One night, during an otherwise ordinary conversation, we started talking about how early kids now get access to phones, tablets, apps, email, and text messages. At the same time, scams are becoming more sophisticated, more convincing, and harder to spot. Yet while companies spend heavily on phishing simulations and cybersecurity awareness training for employees, families are often left to figure it out on their own.
Why should workplace cybersecurity training exist, but not practical, easy-to-understand education for parents, teens, and grandparents?
None of us set out to build just another security product. We are not approaching this as corporate trainers talking down to people. We started as parents who saw a real gap in the market, but building PhishTested has required far more than personal experience. It has pushed us to deepen our understanding of cybersecurity awareness, AI-driven scam patterns, consumer behavior, and the ways modern threats evolve across email, text, social platforms, and other digital channels. From the beginning, our goal has been to make online safety education clear, practical, and accessible for real families.
Built for Today's Threats
PhishTested may have started from a personal conversation, but it has grown into something much more intentional. As we developed the platform, we immersed ourselves in the rapidly evolving threat landscape facing families, including phishing, smishing, social engineering, AI-generated scams, and the ways bad actors exploit everyday technology.
We continue to deepen our knowledge of cybersecurity awareness, consumer technology, and AI-driven risk so we can build a product that reflects how scams actually reach people today. Our focus is not just on awareness, but on creating practical, real-world education that helps families recognize threats earlier, respond with confidence, and build safer digital habits over time.
That combination of personal motivation, hands-on product building, and growing expertise is what drives PhishTested forward.