This is an accepted version of this page John David McAfee (/ˈmækəfiː/ MAK-ə-fee;[5][6] 18 September 1945 – 23 June 2021) was a British and American computer programmer, businessman, and two-time presidential candidate who unsuccessfully sought the Libertarian Party nomination for president of the United States in 2016 and in 2020.

He disavowed the company's continued use of his name in branding, a practice that has persisted in spite of a short-lived corporate rebrand attempt under Intel ownership.

[13] U.S. federal prosecutors brought criminal and civil charges alleging that McAfee had failed to file income taxes over a four-year period.

[14][15] On 23 June 2021, he was found dead due to an apparent suicide by hanging in his prison cell near Barcelona shortly after the Spanish National Court authorized his extradition to the U.S.[16][17][18] His death generated speculation and theories about the possibility that he was murdered.

[28] After receiving his bachelor's degree, McAfee began working towards a doctorate in mathematics at Northeast Louisiana State College, but was expelled in about 1968 because of a relationship with an undergraduate student, who became his first wife.

[25][28] Initially McAfee did not seek a large userbase of paying users, but rather wanted to raise awareness of the need to be protected from computer viruses.

McAfee expressed his pleasure at the name change, saying, "I am now everlastingly grateful to Intel for freeing me from this terrible association with the worst software on the planet.

[39] In 2009, McAfee was interviewed in Belize for the CNBC special The Bubble Decade, in which it was reported that he had invested in and/or built many mansions in the USA that went unsold when the 2007 global recession hit.

[40] In February 2010, McAfee and biologist Allison Adonizio started the company QuorumEx,[41] headquartered in Belize, which aimed to produce herbal antibiotics that disrupt quorum sensing in bacteria.

[45] Also in 2013, McAfee founded Future Tense Central, which aimed to produce a secure computer network device called the D-Central.

[49][50] At the DEF CON conference in Las Vegas in August 2014, McAfee warned people not to use smartphones, suggesting apps are used to spy on clueless consumers who do not read privacy user agreements.

[47] In February 2016, McAfee publicly volunteered to decrypt the iPhone used by Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik in San Bernardino, avoiding the need for Apple to build a backdoor.

[55] He changed MGT's focus from social gaming to cybersecurity, saying "anti-virus software is dead, it no longer works", and that "the new paradigm has to stop the hacker getting in" before they can do damage.

[56] Soon after joining MGT, McAfee said he and his team had exploited a flaw in the Android operating system that allowed him to read encrypted messages from WhatsApp.

Both sides said the split was amicable; he said he wanted to spend all of his time on cryptocurrencies, while the company told of pressure from potential investors to disassociate itself from him.

[64] In July 2017, McAfee predicted on Twitter that the price of a bitcoin would jump to $500,000 within three years, adding: "If not, I will eat my own dick on national television.

[86] McAfee was named a defendant in a 2008 civil court case related to his Aerotrekking light-sport aircraft venture and the death of nephew Joel Bitow and a passenger.

[95] In July 2019, McAfee and members of his entourage were arrested while his yacht was docked at Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic, on suspicion of carrying high-caliber weapons and ammunition.

[97] On 11 August 2020, McAfee falsely stated that he was arrested in Norway during the COVID-19 pandemic after refusing to replace a lace thong with a more effective face mask.

[105][106][107] In December 2012, the magazine Vice accidentally gave away McAfee's location at a Guatemalan resort, when a photo taken by one of its journalists accompanying him was posted with the EXIF geolocation metadata still attached.

[108] While in Guatemala, McAfee asked Chad Essley, an American cartoonist and animator, to set up a blog so he could write about his experience while on the run.

[114][115][116] McAfee later said he faked the heart attacks to buy time for his attorney to file a series of appeals that ultimately prevented his deportation to Belize, thus hastening that government's decision to send him back to the United States.

[121] In January 2019, McAfee announced that he was on the run from U.S. authorities, and living internationally on a boat following the convening of a grand jury to indict him, his wife, and four of his 2020 Libertarian Party presidential primaries staff on tax evasion charges.

The June indictment, which was unsealed upon his arrest, alleged he earned millions of dollars from 2014 to 2018, and failed to file income tax returns.

[123] On 6 October, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a complaint further alleging McAfee and his bodyguard promoted certain initial coin offerings (ICOs) in a fraudulent cryptocurrency pump and dump scheme.

[144] The day after his death, his lawyer told reporters that while he regularly maintained contact with McAfee in prison, there were no signs of suicidal intent.

[149][150] In January 2025 McAfee's X (formerly Twitter) account became active announcing the launch of a new meme coin cryptocurrency and chatbot titled Antivirus.

[153] It covers allegations of him drugging and sexually assaulting his business partner from QuorumEx, Allison Adonizio, and ordering the murders of Belizean David Middleton and American expat Gregory Faull.

[154][155] In an interview with Bloomberg's Pimm Fox and Kathleen Hayes on 8 September 2016, McAfee said these incidents were fabricated, and "Belize is a third-world banana republic and you can go down there and make any story you want if you pay your interviewees, which Showtime did.

"[156][157] Glenn Ficarra and John Requa stated in 2017 they would direct a film about McAfee titled King of the Jungle, written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski.