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Post-BT crypto guru Schneier gets new gig at startup

Securo-boffin to join incidents response firm

Famed cryptographer and security guru Bruce Schneier has moved on from his seven years at BT. Just one month later, he has accepted the role of CTO at incident response startup Co3 Systems.

Schneier left BT last month following a seven-year association with the telco giant by mutual consent. Both parties were keen to stress that the working relationship had come to its natural end, dismissing suggestions that Schneier's recent criticism of the NSA's dragnet surveillance programmes had precipitated his departure.

Co3 Systems makes co-ordination software for incident response. Schneier had previously served on Co3 Systems' advisory board and by joining the firm full time he will be reunited in a working partnership with people he worked with at Counterpane Internet Security prior to the security services firm's purchase by BT in October 2006. John Bruce, Co3's chief exec, formerly served as executive vice president of marketing at Counterpane.

"I'm pretty excited about this," Schneier told El Reg in an email. "It's good to be back at a startup. Plus, John Bruce and I worked together at Counterpane, so we both know exactly what we're getting ourselves into.

"Remember protection, detection, and response?  Counterpane was about the second.  Co3 is about the third.  It's something we should have done at Counterpane, and probably would have had BT not purchased us in 2006," he added.

More details about the move can be found in a post on Schneier's personal blog here.

In a statement, Co3 Systems said Schneier role in the startup "will be to inform and guide Co3's technology and business strategy, evangelizing the 'responsive security' model that he has advocated for many years."

Schneier's a busy guy. As well as writing numerous books on information security and cryptography over the past few years, Schneier also currently serves as a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School; is a program fellow at the New America Foundation's Open Technology Institute; a board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation; and an Advisory Board Member of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. ®

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