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Antivirus Pioneer John McAfee Arrested In Belize

First time accepted submitter rebelwarlock writes "McAfee lives in Belize and he says that he has become a target of the Gang Suppression Unit. He says the GSU came busting into his research facility in Orange Walk, killed his dog, took his passport, handcuffed him and arrested him on a bogus weapons charge. McAfee says he's a victim because he didn't donate money to a known U.D.P. Orange Walk politician."

39 of 367 comments (clear)

  1. About time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    With any luck Norton is next.

  2. Clearly... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...they were just warning him that his subscription was about to run out.

    1. Re:Clearly... by girlintraining · · Score: 5, Insightful

      ...they were just warning him that his subscription was about to run out.

      It's ironic that a man who works for an organization that uses the same business model: paying protection money so nothing bad happens to himself or his property, just had something bad happen to him for not paying a different organization protection money. Antivirus software is based mostly on scare tactics and it is an attempt at fixing the problem of poor digital hygiene. If people were just more careful with their data, and didn't use web browsers or other network software that allowed the execution of arbitrary code (Javascript, for example: 90% of the websites out there that use it could be redesigned to work without it) would find their risk of a virus or malware infection to be slightly above nothing. Of course, you can't eliminate the risk entirely, but there's no need to be dropping $50 plus a year on subscriptions either.

      --
      #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
    2. Re:Clearly... by artor3 · · Score: 5, Informative

      I know you're joking, but a lot of other people aren't and I can't respond to all of them. McAfee (the person) hasn't had anything to do with McAfee (the malware company) for nearly twenty years. He does pharmaceutical research now, and has nearly blown through his entire fortune in the process. Perhaps that's why he could no longer afford to pay the protection money ...er, I mean, make the "political donations".

    3. Re:Clearly... by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's ironic that a man who works for an organization that uses the same business model: paying protection money so nothing bad happens to himself or his property, just had something bad happen to him for not paying a different organization protection money.

      Are you suggesting that MacAfee has been creating viruses? Because you're comparing it to an organization that is both the 'problem' and the 'solution'.

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    4. Re:Clearly... by EdIII · · Score: 4, Informative

      Javascript, for example: 90% of the websites out there that use it could be redesigned to work without it

      So what you are really saying is that you don't know how websites are made?

      Javascript is a client-side scripting language that allows us to modify the DOM (the visible webpage) and make API calls to get data. Without it, there is a hell of lot we just simply cannot do anymore.

      While it may be possible to implement everything in a server side scripting language like PHP, it will not be nearly as pretty or functional. Keep in mind, some of that pretty makes it fairly damned functional by creating UI that are not possible with server side only implementations.

      Whether you like it or not we are going to continue moving towards browsers being merely dynamic front ends for applications and that simply requires client side code. Period.

      The only other option is a metric butt-ton of RDP connections so that users can enjoy an application remotely and that is ridiculously impractical.

      Saying that 90% of websites should be redesigned in such a fashion is quite comical.

    5. Re:Clearly... by Kokuyo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Frankly, I only need it when I surf porn sites and there, Microsoft Security Essentials does the trick. As far as I know, you don't even need to pirate that one.

    6. Re:Clearly... by Kokuyo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      What do you mean expendable? You do realise that those are adult people, yes?

      In case of Katz, alcoholism is a self-inflicted thing that needs the participation and motivation of the afflicted to be cured. Only they can, in fact, cure themselves. How do you even expect us to help them if they do not want to be helped?

      We are not their baby-sitters. It's their lives to do with as they please. And who knows, perhaps Katz liked it that way. Drunk driving aside, who are we to tell him he can't do it that way? I wasn't there and I didn't know the guy so I will certainly not act as if I had the right to judge.

    7. Re:Clearly... by dbIII · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Coincidence. I think not

      They are just two things that depend on the same problem - the failure of Microsoft to introduce a viable security model in the 1990s and the lag relating to compatibility with Microsoft's 1990s software.

    8. Re:Clearly... by sosume · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Not only that. He flees from the US to some tax haven so he won't have to repay society for all the money he extracted. The thing is, he forgot that living in such cheap places come with certain downsides. This was one of them, wait until he gets into a car accident or desperately needs medical attention, he'll remigrate faster than the popups appear for his antivirus programs. Karma est meretrix.

    9. Re:Clearly... by reve_etrange · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I only need it when I surf porn sites and there

      Clearly you haven't read the next article.

      --
      .: Semper Absurda :.
    10. Re:Clearly... by optimism · · Score: 5, Insightful

      AV software is like car insurance

      Only if your car insurance also lowers your gas mileage, decreases your acceleration & cornering & braking performance, and flashes your headlights, while honking your horn randomly, when you're just trying to drive from A to B.

      Most commercial anti-virus software exhibits ~exactly~ the behaviors that people expect from a virus: degraded performance, consumption of disk and memory resources, intrusive popups, etc.

      most of the time you are just paying for nothing but when you actually need it, it's pretty damn helpful.

      When you actually need it, it's too late. As someone mentioned earlier, basic digital hygiene is the best solution. Beyond that a free AV package to run a one-time scan if/when something slips through.

    11. Re:Clearly... by CSMoran · · Score: 5, Funny

      I only need it when I surf porn sites and there

      Clearly you haven't read the next article.

      Or he doesn't surf religious websites.

      --
      Every end has half a stick.
    12. Re:Clearly... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I agree. If you betray the country that enabled you to become wealthy, then don't cry to it for help if you get fucked over in your new tax haven.
      He worked for NASA and for Lockheed Martin, both are government funded, whole or in part.
      His company benefited from the legal protections of the US.
      He moved to Belize to avoid multiple lawsuits.
      Suck it up John; you chose a new devil and know it wants to know you.

    13. Re:Clearly... by arth1 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      That is assuming that free antivirus is as good as paid, which in my experience it is not. I have had to clean up systems running so-called free antivirus and some of them had 30+ varieties of malware.

      How do you know this? By trusting an anti-malware program?
      I see your problem, and it isn't the AV software.

      In truth, AV software, payware or not, is much like bicycle support wheels. They won't prevent you from crashing, and in the long run is a bloody nuisance, but can be useful for new riders or those with no interest in learning how to bike.

      Disclaimer: I was the author of an AV program. It likely was the first such software being able to find newer viruses than the software and libraries, using heuristic algorithms and partial disassembly. It had one big flaw: It listed what the executable looked like it would do, the calculated probability, and expected the user to actually make a judgment. As I said, a big flaw.

    14. Re:Clearly... by arth1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Yes, I have absolutely no sympathy for John McAfee. He made a choice, and has to face the consequences. TANSTAAFL.
      If Belize was truly so much better, we would all live there. (Or, to put it another way, if McAfee was so much better than other AV software, we would all use it...)

      I feel very sorry for the true victim here: the dog.

    15. Re:Clearly... by arth1 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      My AV package doesn't do any of those things. Sure, it isn't great, but it does not get in the way of my work and I am actually more efficient than when not using it. To the best of my knowledge, it has kept me clean the last few years. It's called Ubuntu, maybe you've heard of it.

      Unfortunately, the Ubuntu virus prevents you from running (or causes malfunctions in) packages like Adobe Framemaker, Crystal Reports, Office 2010 with all components, H&R Block TaxCut, and many other applications. I am a Linux user myself, but that doesn't mean I have to also use Windows. It doesn't even mean that my Linux installations are immune to malware. And it'd be a heck of a lot easier to get malware onto an Ubuntu installation through social engineering than a distro where the default isn't to let a user run any program as root through sudo.

      tl;dr: Get off your high horse.

    16. Re:Clearly... by malice · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Indeed, 1/3rd of Belizeans live in the USA, because the economic opportunities are lacking in their country, in no small part due to corruption of local politicians.

      There also are incentives to move to Belize, allowing you to move your household possessions, cars, etc. down there tax-free. Just pay the government a small fee.

      I've spent time down there, it's a beautiful country, but with an odd mix of enclaves of super-expensive housing developments for expats, and shanty towns for locals.

  3. Here's your legal advice Mr. McAfee by BigSlowTarget · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Get the hell out of there as soon as you can. If the corruption is that bad you won't be getting a fair trial.

    1. Re:Here's your legal advice Mr. McAfee by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      At least he's saving on income tax.

    2. Re:Here's your legal advice Mr. McAfee by artor3 · · Score: 4, Funny

      *psst* You might wanna check a map.

  4. Obviously... by hundredrabh · · Score: 5, Funny

    He needs better protection.

    --
    --whacky
  5. Question: Why does this guy live in Belize? by lanner · · Score: 5, Informative
    1. Re:Question: Why does this guy live in Belize? by robotkid · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There's quite alot of foreshadowing in the fastcompany article:

      Then there is the $1 million patrol boat he donated to the Belizean coast guard. (In a letter to The New York Times, he described it as an act of philanthropy; later, he tells me he had to bribe members of the coast guard to prevent them from hassling his ferry business: "This is a third-world country. I had to bribe a whole bunch of folks.

      indicating that he routinely gives large, overt, public bribes to get whatever he wants in Belize

      Then there's this:

      "And so a pair of police officers came to visit him. "We are sorry that we have to tell you to stop building that wall," they said. "I am sorry that I have to tell you that I am going to build it anyway," he told them, and they left. To McAfee, this exchange was proof of the evolved level of discourse in Belize, where a person is largely left to do as he pleases. . . At the time, I thought that he was simply being argumentative. But McAfee seems to want freedom without limitation. Needless to say, few of us exercise this sort of freedom. It tends to be very expensive."

      Either he is willfully ignoring the fact that this seems to have been a small-time shakedown attempt or he is completely oblivious to it. Did he really think Belize patrolmen (note, not the environmental cops) are so genuinely concerned about shoreline regulations?? He doesn't seem to realize by being so brazen about describing large bribes to the press he's just inviting even bigger, less polite shake-downs in the future, which sounds exactly like what (unfortunately) just went down. Did he really think that request for a campaign contribution for the guy employing police hitsquads was purely optional when bribes for building permits, import permits, business titles, etc. for his dozens of shell companies were not?

      Sure, it still sucks, and I feel sorry for him, but it really does sound like he specifically chose Belize because he liked how pliable the laws were if you had money and it never occurred to him that cuts both ways...

  6. Sounds similar to tactics.... by wbr1 · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...McAfee AV used on my PC. I know it held the CPU hostage. And demanded more money and threatened me when I did not pony up. It told me I was not safe.. that I needed to 'buy' protection. I tried contacting the local police, but an IT friend of mine said that the entire county, including the popo was under a McAfee 'contract'.

    --
    Silence is a state of mime.
  7. Re:Well that's funny by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 4, Insightful

    the conservative blogosphere was all atwitter

    You Sir are my grammar hero of the day. What a beautiful sentence :)

    --
    "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
  8. U.D.P by The+Evil+Atheist · · Score: 5, Funny

    This is obviously a warning to keep with TCP and maintain connections.

    --
    Those who do not learn from commit history are doomed to regress it.
  9. Too Often, Killed His Dog by Nom+du+Keyboard · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I'm hearing too often about police raids that involve killing someone's dog in the process. I'm coming to think that killing a person's dog -- whether the person is innocent or not, and the dog most likely is completely innocent -- is a tactic now of police forces around the world to intimidate and harm the suspect regardless of the validity of the raid. Are police being taught that it is just safer to kill any dog they come across? It has gotten to the point where I'm rooting for the dog to win at least once.

    --
    "It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
  10. Aptly named by Black+Parrot · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I bet you thought they were a (gang suppression) unit,

    but they're actually a gang (suppression unit).

    --
    Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
  11. Re:WTF? by tobiah · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They do it to intimidate the owner, the same reason they break down unlocked doors. It's violence that is easily written off as property damage.

    --
    "The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool" - Jane Wagner -
  12. Re:Well that's funny by Curunir_wolf · · Score: 5, Insightful

    When the president of any country publicly calls you out by name and says you're on the "wrong side of the law", you have every reason to be afraid. Especially when the president's appointees have openly practiced and justified the unlimited detention and the killing of citizens without due process.

    Claiming that it's "conservatives" are against this is a pretty disingenuous way to defend this kind of behavior. Especially considering it's likely a conservative president will likely be elected at some time in the future. When he tries these things, will you defend it then, too?

    --
    "Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
    --- Jerry Garcia
  13. Check the citation... by denzacar · · Score: 5, Informative

    From Wikipedia:

    Beginning in February 2010, John started a new venture in the field of bacterial quorum sensing.
    His new company QuorumEx is headquartered in Belize and is working towards producing commercial all natural antibiotics based on anti-quorum sensing technology.[6]

    From the cited article:
    http://edition.channel5belize.com/archives/69891

    Analysts at the Forensic Laboratory, and personnel from the Ministry of Health were taken to inspect the facility and samples of an alleged antibiotic apparently being manufactured at the Laboratory were also taken for analysis.
    The Ministry of Health has already confirmed that no licence has been granted to McAfee or any of his agents to manufacture antibiotics in Belize.
    Doing so without a licence is an offence under the Antibiotics Act.

    Then, there are bits that seem a tad... not directly related to the alleged main issue of the police action:

    Present on the premises at the time were John McAfee, his girlfriend who is a seventeen year old Belizean minor, five security guards.
      ...
     
    Further investigation led into a query regarding the employment of the security guards. This revealed that only two of the four guards on the premises were licensed to act as security guards.

      ...
     
    At the end of the search, three of the security guards were arrested and charged for "Providing Security Services without a License".

    Also, the dog was not shot dead. It was "fatally wounded".

    ...the GSU says that three of the eleven dogs on the premises attacked and bit one of the officers on his right thigh.
    The same dog then attacked a B.D.F. soldier who responded by fatally wounded the dog.

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  14. Porn sites are more ethical, anyway by Kupfernigk · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Is this flamebait? Anyway, yes, as a (not very good perhaps) Quaker, with our testimony to ethical business, I have to observe that people who want pictures of naked people having sex go to porn sites where they presumably get exactly that. Most of the religious websites I have (usually accidentally) visited make extremely dubious and unprovable claims which, for any other subject, would in this country be regulated by the Advertising Standards Authority. So it doesn't surprise me that the operators of those religious websites are more likely to find themselves hosting malicious material; in some cases the entire website is clearly malicious in intent, since it attempts to persuade people of things for which a great deal of evidence exists that they are untrue.

    --
    From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
    1. Re:Porn sites are more ethical, anyway by CSMoran · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Finally, I'd say many religious websites are probably made by amateurs and hence are easily exploitable by third parties to serve malware.

      --
      Every end has half a stick.
  15. No, it isn't by Kupfernigk · · Score: 5, Informative

    It has been independent since 1981. Which coincidentally was the year it started to degenerate.

    --
    From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
  16. Re:WTF? by arth1 · · Score: 5, Funny

    if I was swat, I wouldn't want a 120lbs german shepard trying to tear my leg apart.

    A 120 lb German Shepherd is a seriously fat dog unlikely to attack anything but its food bowl.

  17. This is right on track by CFD339 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I was thinking exactly the same thing as I read Kupfernigk response. The sites which are least professionally built and maintained are most vulnerable to outsiders planting malware. Many of the less mainstream religious sites fall into this category of low technical management and are thus vulnerable.

    Porn, being a huge industry, seems to get the attention of more skilled developers and administrators (if not actors and camera people). While surely some are not, and those will be vulnerable, I think most of the porn sites that are malware laden fall into the category of 'honeypots' with either fake or real porn placed with the deliberate goal of being a malware vector.

    --
    The problem with quotes on the internet, is that nobody bothers to check their veracity. -- Abraham Lincoln
  18. Re:WTF? by shiftless · · Score: 5, Informative

    Why are you shocked and surprised? This happens every day in the United States in drug raids. Whole family is sitting down to dinner, just chilling one evening, then the door explodes (gotta love those no-knock warrants) while armed thugs swarm in, family dog gets a bullet (well that pomeranian could have gotten a cop and given him an infection ya know), kids are screaming while mom and dad are roughly thrown to the ground. Thugs take their time searching through the house and snickering loudly at mom's sex toys. Sometimes people even get shot for absolutely no reason.

    Welcome to the creeping tyranny of a police state. Not so fun to actually be a part of one, is it?

  19. Udopeian Paradise by SuperKendall · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Actually, Belize is amazing and safe.

    True police states are indeed safe and lovely to visit, for those who do not have to live in them or fear being able to leave ever.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley