Press Release FeedGet the RSS feed
Menu

Business Wire

Rhuna and Alcatraz AI Turn the Face Into the Ticket at UNTOLD, One of the World's Top Three Music Festivals

Business Wire

Privacy-first facial authentication brought effortless, anonymized entry to Transylvania in a pilot developed with CNKT Labs

CUPERTINO, Calif., October 20, 2026--Rhuna and Alcatraz AI have brought privacy forward face as a credential to UNTOLD, ranked among the top three music festivals in the world, in a pilot developed with venture studio CNKT Labs. It is the Face ID of physical spaces, applied to a 500,000-attendee festival.

At UNTOLD 2026 in Transylvania this summer, thousands of attendees opted in by choosing to use their face as their credential when they bought their ticket. Concert goers then entered and moved in and out of the festival grounds without the hassle of showing a phone or presenting a paper ticket. The gate was an Intelligent Door, powered by Alcatraz's Rock reader. The privacy forward technology is known as facial authentication, not facial recognition: it confirms that a person is the verified ticket holder and does nothing else. Unlike surveillance based facial recognition technology that relies on photographs, the Rock does not have or store any personal information like names or photographs. Alcatraz simply authenticates on the device at the gate, not in the cloud. Each face is converted into an encrypted template and matched locally, an approach built to comply with GDPR, CCPA and BIPA. Participation was optional. The AI-driven system works in real time at the door, and like FACE ID, it is designed to safeguard individual privacy. It also detects tailgating as it happens, alerting security the moment someone tries to follow a verified guest through the gate.

The pilot combined three companies' strengths. Rhuna, co-founded by CEO Sveatoslav Vizitiu and CCO Bogdan Radulescu, runs a single platform for payments, ticketing, access control and data, shaped by more than a decade of operating UNTOLD. Alcatraz AI, founded by Vince Gaydarzhiev, protects more than five million employees at Fortune 500 companies, airports and stadiums across the United States. CNKT Labs, led by founder and CEO Deian Markov, brought the founders together and helped connect the two products: software that knows who holds a ticket, and hardware that recognizes them at the gate.

"UNTOLD is where we test what the next generation of live events will look like," said Sveatoslav Vizitiu, CEO and Co-founder of Rhuna. "Running facial entry at a festival of this size gave us a real-world proof point at a scale most pilots never reach, and it shows where access and payments are heading: one identity, from the ticket purchase to the gate to the bar."

  1. ExtelJ.P. Morgan Stays Top of Extel’s All-America Equities Research TableExtel's 55th annual survey reveals J.P. Morgan, BofA Securities and Morgan Stanley as the top US research providers. Jefferies leads the analyst leaderboard with BofA and Evercore tied for second. NEW YORK, October 20, 2026--Extel, the leading provider of market sentiment in the financial industry, has
  2. AIAI makes website performance a boardroom priority as digital businesses lose an estimated £336,000 a year to downtimeThe average digital business estimates it loses £336,0001 every year to website downtime during peak trading, according to a new study from Cloudways. Four in five (80%1) businesses believe technical website performance now plays a bigger role in online visibility than content alone. More than three quarters (77%1) say tr
  3. AIEdgeConneX and Hello World Launch Statewide Initiative to Expand Computer Science and AI Education for Ohio StudentsMulti-year investment launches two initiatives already reaching 10,000 Ohio students, expanding a program on track to serve more than 100,000 students across multiple states by early 2027 COLUMBUS, Ohio, October 20, 2026--EdgeConneX ®, a pioneer in global Build-to-Suit and Build-to-Density digital inf
  4. FinanceSOAR AI, Inc.SOAR AI’s Ohio AI Compute Campus on Track for December 31 In-Service Date, with Contracted Revenue Expected to Begin January 2027Data hall transformers and cooling plant equipment being installed this week; approximately $1.2 billion of contracted capacity expected to generate approximately $175 million to $200 million of revenue in 2027 NORTH CANTON, Ohio, October 20, 2026--SOAR AI, Inc. (NYSE American: SOAR), formerly known as
  5. FinanceAgilysys, Inc.Top-Ranked Casino Resorts Use The Agilysys Connected Ecosystem To Deliver Personalized ExperiencesAAA Unveils Inaugural Diamond Top 10 Casino Hotel List Recognizing Exceptional Hospitality and Memorable Guest Experiences ALPHARETTA, Ga., October 20, 2026--Agilysys, Inc. (Nasdaq: AGYS), a global hospitality-focused technology provider, today announced that 8 of the 10 casino resorts named to the in
  6. AIKeepitKeepit's AI Security and Cyber Resilience Platform Wins Four Top Infosec Innovator AwardsThe SaaS data protection platform also earned a Cloud Computing Security Excellence Award from TMC and Cloud Computing Magazine this month COPENHAGEN, Denmark, October 20, 2026--Keepit , a global SaaS data protection provider, today announced it has won four categories at the Top Infosec Innovator 2026 awards, presented by Cyber Defense Magazine. Keepit was named winner in: "Visionary AI Cybersec