Intel Ditches McAfee Brand, John McAfee Gives Thanks

Intel announced the launch of a new Intel Security brand, and that all McAfee products will be transitioned over to this brand over time.

The company bought McAfee for $7.6 billion in 2010.

“The complexity of keeping digital identities safe grows as mobile applications and devices become a more important part of our daily lives,” said CEO Brian Krzanich. “Intel’s intent is to intensify our efforts dedicated to making the digital world more secure, and staying ahead of threats to private information on mobile and wearable devices.”

He also announced plans to offer elements of McAfee’s security solutions for mobile devices for free, promising further details in the coming months.

McAfee founder whose name has been in the news a lot in the past year due to the murder of his neighbor in Belize and McAfee’s ensuing saga, couldn’t be happier that his name is being stripped away from Intel’s security products.

If you’ll recall, McAfee put out a rather humorous video last year about the frequent emails he receives in relation to the software (it really is worth a watch):

McAfee actually wrote a blog post last month calling for Intel to move on from the McAfee name, and calling upon the Internet to help them come up with some ideas.

He wrote (link in the above tweet), “I would be thrilled to finally free myself, my image, and my name (which I had long before I created McAfee Associates, and am far too old to change.) In an effort to avoid years of increasing public humiliation, public relations nightmares, and negative associations with a company who’s recent reputation has been less than stellar in it’s industry, I would like to make the following offer to anyone interested.”

He then asked for help compiling a list of possible new names for McAfee Corp. to get to the company promising that if a person’s name was selected, he’d provide them with a full year subscription to Norton Antivirus Software and dinner in a city of their choosing.

Image: John McAfee