[1][4][2] After his parents' divorce when he was 10, Kroll was raised in the suburbs of Detroit, graduating from Bloomfield Hills Andover High School, and then dropping out of community college to work on coding projects for local businesses.
[5][6][7] Kroll worked as an engineering manager at Right Media, a subsidiary of Yahoo!, from 2007 to 2009 and as chief technology officer at Jetsetter from 2009 to 2013.
[11] After working at Twitter following the acquisition, Kroll was dismissed following "bad management" and extensive allegations of workplace sexual harassment of women.
[9] Kroll and his business partner Yusupov formed Intermedia Labs, the company behind HQ Trivia.
[3][12] Police were called to Kroll's apartment in SoHo, Manhattan shortly after midnight on December 16, 2018, when his girlfriend became concerned after making multiple unsuccessful attempts to contact him by phone throughout the previous day.