Mikko Hypponen, a veteran cybersecurity expert with over 35 years of experience, describes the field as “cybersecurity Tetris.” Successes vanish when you do your job perfectly, while failures pile up. He began fighting malware in the late 1980s, analyzing thousands of threats from early floppy disk viruses to the infamous ILOVEYOU worm. Today, malware is largely the domain of criminals and state spies, not hobbyists. The industry has professionalized, making devices like iPhones remarkably secure.
Now, Hypponen has pivoted to a new challenge: countering drones. Motivated by the war in Ukraine and living near Finland’s border with Russia, he works to protect people from unmanned aerial attacks. He sees clear parallels between fighting malware and drones. Both involve creating signatures to detect threats and engaging in a constant cat-and-mouse game with adversaries. For Hypponen, the enemy remains familiar; after a career fighting Russian malware, he now focuses on countering Russian drone threats.