Today, VivaCell-MTS hosted Eugene Kaspersky, Chairman and CEO of Kaspersky Lab. Eugene Kaspersky is the sixth laureate of the Award of the President of the Republic of Armenia for an Outstanding Contribution to Global IT. He visited VivaCell-MTS headquarters to participate in a joint press conference together with VivaCell-MTS General Manager Ralph Yirikian, and Chairman of the GIT Award Committee Hovik Musaelyan. 

 

After the press conference, Eugene Kaspersky delivered a presentation called ‘The Internet of Threats’ for the ICT community representatives. The main subject was the current and future landscape of cyberattacks. According to the IT security guru, there are three main groups of threats in the IT sector: cybercrime, the growing complex risks of cyber-espionage, and the threat of the use of cyberweapons against critical infrastructure. He warned that with the growing dependence on digital equipment and machinery, the world is becoming increasingly exposed to the risk of cyber-terrorism. Eugene Kaspersky also offered his vision on what needs to be done on a local and global scale to make the use of the Internet and digital equipment significantly more safe and secure. 

 

Eugene Kaspersky is on a visit to Armenia to receive the Global Award of the President of the Republic of Armenia for Outstanding Contribution to Humanity through IT (Global IT Award 2015). The awarding ceremony will take place on November 17, at the Presidential Palace. Inaugurated in 2009 by the decree of the President of Armenia, the Global IT Award honors individuals who have made extraordinary contributions to humanity through advancing the world of IT. It is granted on an annual basis to individuals whose internationally acclaimed contributions to IT have resulted in significant developments that have positively impacted or hold the potential to positively impact the humanity. Eugene Kaspersky is the sixth GIT Award laureate. Previous laureates include retired CEO/ Chairman of the Board of Intel Corporation, Craig Barrett in 2010, co-founder of Apple Computers, Inc. Steve Wozniak in 2011 and Chairman Emeritus of Synaptics, Inc. Federico Faggin in 2012, President of the Society of Semiconductor Industry Specialists, President of Techno Vision consulting firm Tsugio Makimoto in 2013, Senior Vice President and General Manager for the Insieme Business Unit at Cisco Mario Mazzola in 2014. 

 

Commenting on his award, Eugene Kaspersky, Chairman and CEO of Kaspersky Lab, said: “I’m most grateful for my Presidential Award, and it’s a great honor for me to join the line-up of outstanding tech-gurus chosen in previous years to be laureates of the President of the Republic of Armenia’s GIT Award. We’ve been working in Armenia for quite a long time now, paying particular attention to educational projects for students and IT specialists. It’s fantastic to see the sphere of information technology getting the strongest of support at the governmental level on account of the fact that the IT industry is becoming more and more important in terms of both social and economic development.”

 

“In today’s world, where nations’ strength is determined by technological superiority and economic strength, ICT is considered to be a key factor to our country’s economic growth. Working as part of the ICT sector we are the eyewitness of the everyday achievements of Armenian specialists. Our country has a huge unrealized potential for national achievements in the sphere of high technologies, and for the economic growth, as its ultimate outcome. Therefore, it is our duty to support such important national projects encouraging further development of this sphere,” VivaCell-MTS General Manager Ralph Yirikian said. “For six years in a row we are part of this project which first of all aims at creating in Armenians the self-image of a nation having real achievements in ICT, and in doing so aims at translating that self-image into a strong external image for our country and our nation. We all have to synergize our resources in order to achieve the state when ICT will be a distinctive capability of our Nation, along with the achievements of the past, no other nation can replicate”, Ralph Yirikian added.       

The award is an opportunity to encourage the development of information technologies in Armenia and is very important in terms of positioning Armenia on the world map as a country with potential for higher achievements in the sphere of high-tech. VivaCell-MTS is sure that the Armenian youth are talented and have huge potential of self-development, and they just need support to realize that potential, to express oneself and find the true path. The GIT award has a potential to attract young Armenians attention to the IT sphere. The Company spares no effort to provide Armenia’s progress in the sphere of information technologies. 

VivaCell-MTS has been the sponsor of the initiative for six years. The Company has donated AMD 125 million for the realization of the program.

 

VivaCell-MTS... You are connected! Follow the link to find more information about Kaspersky Lab and Eugene Kaspersky: https://kas.pr/ArmeniaITAward.

 

Eugene Kaspersky

Chief Executive Officer and Chairman, Kaspersky Lab

 

Eugene Kaspersky is a world-renowned cybersecurity expert and successful entrepreneur. He is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Kaspersky Lab, the world’s largest privately-held vendor of endpoint protection and cybersecurity solutions.

 

Eugene began his career in cybersecurity accidentally when his computer became infected with the ‘Cascade’ virus in 1989. Eugene’s specialized education in cryptography helped him analyze the encrypted virus and understand its behavior and then develop a removal tool for it. After successfully removing the virus, Eugene’s curiosity and passion for computer technology drove him to start analyzing more malicious programs and developing disinfection modules for them. This exotic collection of anti-virus modules would eventually become the foundation for Kaspersky Lab’s antivirus database. Today the database is one of the most comprehensive and complete collections in cybersecurity, detecting and preventing systems from being infected by more than 100 million malicious programs.

 

Further pursuing his passion for defensive technologies, in 1990 Eugene started gathering a team of like-minded enthusiast researchers to create the AVP Toolkit Pro antivirus program, which four years later was recognized by the University of Hamburg as the most effective antivirus software in the world. 

 

Wishing to combine their successful track record of antivirus programming with their entrepreneurial vision, Eugene and his colleagues decided to establish their own independent company. In 1997 Kaspersky Lab was founded, with Eugene heading the company’s antivirus research. In 2007 he was named Kaspersky Lab’s CEO. 

 

Today Kaspersky Lab is one of the fastest growing IT security vendors worldwide, operating in more than 200 countries and territories worldwide. The company employs approximately 3,000 professionals and IT security specialists in dedicated regional offices across 31 countries and its cybersecurity technologies protect over 400 million users worldwide. 

 

Eugene has earned a number of international awards for his technological, scientific and entrepreneurial achievements. He was voted the World’s Most Powerful Security Exec by SYS-CON Media in 2011, awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Science from Plymouth University in 2012, and named one of Foreign Policy Magazine’s 2012 Top Global Thinkers for his contribution to IT security awareness on a global scale.

 

  -   Science and Technology