The family is directly descended from a line of distinguished rabbis, including Alexander Süsskind of Grodno, Eliezer Simcha Rabinowitz [2] and Binyamin Diskin.

His grandfather, Chaim Japhet, was a member of the pre-state Jewish National Council, the deputy of Henrietta Szold and one of the pioneers of social work in Israel.

[1] During his university studies, Japhet worked full-time at BRM Technologies as head of the computer virus analysis team (the product was later sold to Norton).

At that point, Japhet took a six-month career break to research his family history, traveling around the world to interview relatives.

[10] The company uses a wide range of technologies to assist family history research, including face detection, semantic analysis, and DNA testing.

MyHeritage offers free tools for creating family trees, thereby making genealogical research accessible to the general population.

[15] In 2013–2014, Japhet initiated and implemented a pro bono project for the restitution of Holocaust victims' property in East Germany after a reporter for an online newspaper, Ofer Aderet, revealed that there was a deadline for applying for compensation for assets stolen by the Nazis, and descendants would not be able to file claims after a certain date.

[16] Doreen Carvajal, a reporter for the New York Times in Paris, heard about this work and invited Japhet to cooperate with her in locating heirs, mostly Holocaust victims, whose artworks were stolen by the Nazis during World War II.

Carvajal sent Japhet the names of four Jews listed in the MNR (National Museums Restitution) database of stolen art compiled by Rose Valland.

She published a story about it in the New York Times that caused a stir and encouraged the French authorities to invest greater effort in locating heirs.

As part of this project, Japhet recruited a team of 120 volunteers, half of them MyHeritage employees, to photograph the gravestones in Holon Cemetery, Israel's largest burial grounds, for the purpose of genealogical documentation.

[22] [23] In 2011, Sarah Lacy devoted a chapter in her book, Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky, to Japhet, as one of the most influential global entrepreneurs outside the United States.