In the nine eighties and nineties. John McAfee was a Silicon Valley icon. Well great, um, we were supposed to have a meeting at eight this morning. Again, he said yeah, but I was hungover. His name was synonymous with computer anti virus software, so I said, would you mind if I came over to the lab and spent some time with you there to try to understand the technology better. And it took me all of fifteen minutes in the
R and D lab to realize he was brilliant. He helped invent the modern cybersecurity industry, and it made him fabulously wealthy. When we were together, women would just like falling his spell and sleep with him or go away with him. It's just amazing. But after he sold his company and bosked in his riches, things took a dark turn and he just slowly, like a spider throwing a web around its cry. It just becomes this, this galloping circus of stupidity that he finds so cute. A man
is dead. I will not allow them to imprison me and shut my voice down. I'm your host, Jamie Tara Bay. I cover cybersecurity for Bloomberg News. I've been a foreign correspondent for over twenty years. Throughout my career, I've reported on powerful people with God complexes, people who didn't believe they had to be held accountable for their actions, people who may have gotten away with murder. They want to
silence me. I will not allow that. This season on Foundering will retrace the life of John McAfee, from his rise in Silicon Valley to his chaotic journey through Central America, and how his choices led him down the path towards a public and decades long self destruction. When I heard that he was arrested in Spain, I knew that he had been with them, and Uh, these are very powerful man. I don't want to get too far into it, just
to protect myself. Foundering a podcast from Bloomberg Technology. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.