https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57589822

John McAfee: Anti-virus creator found dead in prison cell

Published
    13 hours ago

image copyrightReuters

Anti-virus software entrepreneur John McAfee has been found dead in a Barcelona prison cell hours after a Spanish court agreed to extradite him to the US to face tax evasion charges.

The Catalan justice department said medics had tried to resuscitate the 75-year-old, but were not successful.

It added that "everything indicates" McAfee had taken his own life.

A controversial figure in the tech world, his company released the first commercial anti-virus software.

McAfee VirusScan helped to spark a multi-billion dollar industry in the computer world, and was eventually sold to technology giant Intel for more than $7.6bn (£4.7bn).

    The strange life of John McAfee
    McAfee arrested in Spain over tax evasion charges

In October 2020, John McAfee was arrested in Spain when he was about to board a plane to Turkey, and accused of failing to file tax returns for four years, despite earning millions from consulting work, speaking engagements, crypto-currencies and selling the rights to his life story.

The US justice department alleged that McAfee evaded tax liability by having his income paid into bank accounts and cryptocurrency exchange accounts in the names of nominees.

He was also accused of concealing assets, including a yacht and real estate property, also in other people's names.

Spain's National Court authorised his extradition to the US to face the charges on Wednesday morning.

In recent years, McAfee had repeatedly claimed that there was a plot to get him - however the court said there was "no revealing evidence" that he was being prosecuted for political or ideological reasons, Spanish newspaper El Pais reported.

He had argued in a hearing earlier this month that the charges against him were politically motivated and that he would spend the rest of his life in prison if returned to the US.

But Nishay Sanan, McAfee's lawyer, said he had intended to fight all the charges.

"This is again the US government trying to erase John McAfee," Mr Sanan told NPR on Wednesday. "This man was a fighter. And in the minds of everyone who knew him, he will always be a fighter."
image copyrightGetty Images
image captionJohn McAfee, shown here in Miami Beach, Florida, was a controversial figure in the technology sector

The entrepreneur, who was born in Gloucestershire, England first came to prominence in the 1980s when he founded his tech company and released McAfee VirusScan.

Although a pioneer of computer security, he once admitted to the BBC that he never actually used the software on his own computers - or any anti-virus software for that matter.

"I protect myself by constantly changing my IP [internet protocol] address, by not attaching my name to any device I use, and by not going on to sites where you might pick up a virus," he told the BBC's technology reporter Leo Kelion in 2013.

"Porn sites, for example, I just don't go there."
media captionJohn McAfee in 2014: "We cannot have intrusions into our lives and still have freedom"

He also launched unsuccessful bids to become the Libertarian Party's candidate for the presidential elections in 2016 and 2020.

In 2019 McAfee expressed his disdain for taxes, tweeting that he had not filed tax returns for eight years because "taxation is illegal."

In the same year he was briefly detained in the Dominican Republic for allegedly bringing weapons into the country.

McAfee never fitted into the mould of what a tech entrepreneur might look like. He was brash, reckless and never far away from the next scandal.

McAfee himself is best known for the company he founded and named.

It was wildly successful and made him a rich man. He also helped to create a multi-billon-dollar computer security software industry in the process.

McAfee was a visionary, but also hot headed. It was his temperament that got him into trouble throughout his life.

In 2012 he was arrested in Guatemala, having been on the run in Belize where police were investigating the death of his neighbour.

He always denied any involvement in the murder.

A prominent libertarian, engaging speaker and crypto enthusiast, McAfee still had the ability to make money. His latest brush with law enforcement was due to alleged tax evasion on his recent earnings.

He will be remembered, rightly, as an important figure in the development of the technology scene of the 1980s and 1990s. But he will also be remembered as a deeply controversial figure, who at times seemed intent in taking a path in life that might lead to trouble.
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Posted on novaBBS

Epstein says hello. Curious, these suicides in supposed high security facilities....
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Posted on Rocksolid Light

Anonymous wrote:

Epstein says hello. Curious, these suicides in supposed high security facilities....

Makes one think that possibly something else may be going on...
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Posted on Rocksolid Light

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Epstein says hello. Curious, these suicides in supposed high security facilities....

Makes one think that possibly something else may be going on...

I'm sure epstein was suicided. Not sure why they'd do mcafee, he didn't have stuff on powerful ppl afaik, but I don't think he'd kill himself either so which is it?
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Posted on Rocksolid Light

Not sure why they'd do mcafee, he didn't have stuff on powerful ppl afaik

Of course I don't know if he actually had something, but he surely claimed it.
There is a tweet or article (I forgot) from years back, in which he bragged that if he ever got arrested shit would hit the fan for several powerful people. Don't have the link anymore, but sure is easy to find.
Guess that he had some coding skills, maybe he leeched some harddisks and found cipo or somesuch (could have even done that with his software, come to think of it, just include checksums of known illegal files in your "antivirus" code, and trigger silent alarms, and hey presto, you have plenty of windows users by the balls. Just saying....:=) ).
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Posted on Rocksolid Light

Anonymous wrote:

Not sure why they'd do mcafee, he didn't have stuff on powerful ppl afaik

Of course I don't know if he actually had something, but he surely claimed it.

Found this https://www.the-sun.com/news/1297548/john-mcafee-dirt-those-power-expose-truth-jailed-dies/


'PRAY I LIVE TO 100' John McAfee claims he has ‘dirt on those in power’ and threatens to finally expose ‘the truth’ if he’s jailed or dies

    Tom Michael

    10:31 ET, Aug 12 2020

JOHN McAfee has claimed he has dirt on “those in power” and threatened to finally expose “the truth” if he’s jailed or dies.

The eccentric tech millionaire, who says he is "on the run", made the sensational claims in a series of bizarre Twitter posts today.
John McAfee holds two guns in a picture posted to Instagram
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John McAfee holds two guns in a picture posted to InstagramCredit: Getty Images
An older photo shows McAfee posing with a large rifle
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An older photo shows McAfee posing with a large rifle

McAfee, who has a record of making mischievous false statements on social media, appeared to suggest his life is in danger.

And he claimed he had set up a “deadman switch” to spill untold dirt on unnamed people if he were to die or disappear mysteriously.

In an initial cryptic tweet, he wrote: “People ask why I do the things I do.

“An act by itself is incomplete. It's the reason for the act that completes it and provides the real information. I am [on] the run.

“I would be an idiot to explain my 'why's'.”
'DEADMAN SWITCH'

He then added: “I neither fear death nor run from it. At my age it sits on my shoulder as a constant companion. It makes me fearless.”

One of his Twitter followers replied to the murky messages, saying: “I hope you've set up a deadman switch so we know the true 'why' instead of whatever is fed to us when that sad time comes.”

Fuelling the conspiracy theories, McAfee answered: “I have. If I'm arrested or disappear, or die ... every news outlet in the planet will be told the truth.

“Those in power, if they have any sense, will pray that I live free to 100.”

It comes hours after the tycoon alleged he was arrested in Norway for wearing a thong instead of a coronavirus mask – but then admitted it was all a hoax.
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John McAfee has admitted claims he was arrested in Norway were a hoax
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John McAfee has admitted claims he was arrested in Norway were a hoaxCredit: Twitter
McAfee seen wearing a thong mask on the steps of a private jet
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McAfee seen wearing a thong mask on the steps of a private jetCredit: NBC

McAffee, 75, is known as the founder of McAfee Associates, which he ran between 1987 and 1994 before resigning from the company.

He later founded a number of other companies, and prior to the 2008 financial crash was worth an estimated £60million.

He has had numerous run-ins with the law in the past and claimed to be on the run from the US after not paying taxes since 2010.

But after being arrested last year in the Dominican Republic he was released after cops there established he was not the subject of any active legal cases or extradition requests in America, his lawyer said.

Recent tweets from McAfee suggested he was in Belarus.
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In the summer of last year, he was detained in the Dominican Republican after a cache of weapons was found on his boat.

Numerous pictures have previously showed him and wife Janice posing with a range of large guns and rifles.

McAfee was also reportedly wanted as a "person of interest" in connection with the 2012 killing of an American man in Belize, though has denied any involvement.
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Posted on Rocksolid Light

from where did he get a gun

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Posted on Rocksolid Light

Anonymous wrote:

from where did he get a gun

I don't think the article tells how he was killed, I mean how he killed himself. Was a gun used? If so, I missed that.

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Posted on Rocksolid Light