A tech tycoon who values privacy
By: Maija Palmer, FInancial Times
Eugene Kaspersky rubs shoulders with world security chiefs regularly these days. He has just been on a panel with Condoleezza Rice, the former US secretary of state, at a security summit in Yalta. Next he is meeting European defence ministers in Brussels.
The co-founder and chief executive of Kaspersky Labs, the Russian internet security company, is proud of his high-level contacts – but says it is also worrying. “It is nice to be recognised, but it’s bad, too. The situation on cyber security must be so serious now if I am recognised as important.”
Since the Stuxnet virus was discovered to be attacking Iranian nuclear facilities in 2010, cyber security has risen up the political agenda and world leaders have been keen to hear what Mr Kaspersky has to say. He has been predicting cyber attacks on critical infrastructure facilities for more than a decade, and this year Kaspersky Labs was the first to discover the Flame worm that is used in targeted cyber espionage in the Middle East.
