The roller coaster life of the Founder of McAfee

• John David McAfee started his career as a door-to-door Salesman.
• His net worth was $100 million at his peak when he left McAfee company.

 

John McAfee is one of the most interesting yet controversial figures in the world of cybersecurity. The life he led was full of ups and downs. Many documentaries based on his life delve into the details of his life and death. 

 

In this article, we will try to answer all the interesting questions about his life, such as:

1. How a young man who started as a door-to-door salesman became the owner of one of the biggest antivirus companies?
2. How his net worth, which was once $100 million reduced by 94% to just $4 million?
3. When did he try to run in the US Presidential election?

Early Life of McAfee

John David McAfee was born in the UK in 1945. He was a British-American as his father was American while his mother was British. His father was an alcoholic who committed suicide when John was just 15. Around this time, John started consuming drugs and alcohol which he continued  until his death.

In 2008 he was awarded with a doctor of science degree in Mathematics from the Roanoke College. Subsequently, he studied at Northeast Louisiana State College to earn a mathematics doctorate. However, he was expelled by the college because of his involvement in an affair with an undergraduate student.

The Career of McAfee

He began his career by working as a door-to-door salesman selling magazines. His fascination with computers began when he started working at a firm that coded the punch card system.

In the 70s and 80s, his career took a giant leap forward when he managed to land a job at NASA’s Institute for Space Studies. 

Starting the McAfee Company

While working at Lockheed, he learned about the first computer virus, the brain virus. He decided to develop antivirus software and founded McAfee. Soon, McAfee became the top computer security provider company. In 1994 John McAfee left his company and sold his shares for $100 million.

Net worth loss

In 2008, due to the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers, his net worth of $100 million plummeted to just $4 million. This was because he purchased millions of dollars of bonds. the world was affected by the global financial crisis. As a result, the value of Mortgage-backed securities tied to American real estate collapsed. This further triggered the international banking crisis.

Politics

On 8 September 2015, McAfee announced that he would be running as a presidential candidate in the presidential elections of 2016. He was a libertarian and advocated for the end of the war on drugs and the decriminalization of cannabis. He believed in a free market economy and free trade. 

He secured the second spot in the primaries and the third spot at the 2016 Libertarian National Convention.

His support for Crypto

McAfee was a strong supporter of Bitcoin, and he predicted that Bitcoin’s value would reach $1 million. Initially, he predicted that Bitcoin’s value would reach $500,000. But later he revised his prediction.

Death of McAfee

Authorities say that he committed suicide by hanging himself in a jail in Barcelona. But his lawyer and his widow claim that he was murdered.