AMTSO Board of Directors
- Righard J. Zwienenberg
- David Harley
- Stuart Taylor
- Roel Schouwenberg
- Mark Kennedy
- Gabor Szappanos
- Karel Obluk
- Andreas Marx
- Igor Muttik
Righard J. Zwienenberg
Righard J. Zwienenberg started dealing with computer viruses in 1988 after encountering the first virus problems on a system at the Technical University of Delft. His interest thus kindled, Zwienenberg has studied virus behaviour and presented solutions and detection schemes ever since. Initially he started as an independent consultant, then in 1991 he co-founded CSE Ltd where he was the Research and Development Manager. In October 1995, Zwienenberg left CSE and one month later he started at the Research and Development department of ESaSS BV – developers of ThunderBYTE – to reinforce the team and have some new challenges in life. In 1998, Norman Data Defense Systems acquired ESaSS and Zwienenberg joined the Norman Development team where he was working on the engine of Norman Virus Control and represented Norman in several cooperation-bodies. In 2005 Zwienenberg took the role of Chief Research Officer at Norman. After AMTSO was formed, Zwienenberg was chosen as its president.
He serves on the Board of Directors for Anti-Virus Asia Researchers (AVAR), the Technical Overview Board of the WildList Organization. Zwienenberg has been a member of CARO since late 1992. He is a frequent speaker at conferences – among these Virus Bulletin, EICAR, AVAR, RSA, InfoSec, etc - and seminars. His interests are not limited to viruses but have broadened to include general security issues and encryption technologies over the past years. His hobbies include Star Trek, Rock & Roll and Rhythm and Blues music, theatre and movies. A few years ago he took up the art of magic again and playing the drums as well.
David Harley
David Harley has worked in independent anti-malware research since 1989, working in support, system administration and security analysis at Imperial Cancer Research Fund, where he was also responsible for testing, evaluation and procurement. From 2001-2006 he worked for the UK’s National Health Service, where ran the Threat Assessment Centre with particular responsibility for email security.
After a couple of years of authoring and consultancy, he joined ESET as a full-time researcher in 2008 and is now Director of Malware Intelligence. His books include “Viruses Revealed” and “The AVIEN Malware Defense Guide” (both of which included chapters on testing and evaluation). He has contributed to many other books and publications, and many white papers, conference papers etc. He is COO of AVIEN and MD of Small Blue-Green World. His qualifications include CISSP, BS7799 (or whatever it is nowadays),and ITIL service management, and he is a Fellow of the British Computer Society.
Stuart Taylor
Stuart Taylor is the UK Threat Lab Manager for Sophos. Stuart graduated in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from Aston University in Birmingham. He spent the first part of his career as a software and electronic engineer in various industries culminating in 10 years writing software and developing electronics for mixing consoles used in the music and film industry.
Looking for a career change Stuart joined Sophos in 1997 and went from writing software to pulling it apart, analysing the latest malware - at that time principally DOS, macro and script viruses. He went on to lead the team in the UK and helped Sophos to expand their network of laboratories by opening labs in Boston, MA and Sydney, Australia.
Stuart continues to manage the UK Threat Lab with specific responsibility for industry malware tests. He was elected to the Board of AMTSO at the outset , is the treasurer to the organisation and is also Chairman of the Board of Directors.
Stuart lives in Oxford, UK with his wife, Jill.
Roel has nearly a decade of malware research and analysis experience. He monitors the state of malware in North America providing advanced analysis of malware. Roel focuses on classic virus techniques that are used in today's malware and improving proactive detection capabilities. He conducts research into file format parsing vulnerabilities such as malicious PDFs and is also heavily involved with the issues of anti-malware testing and is one of the founding members of AMTSO. Mark joined Symantec as an engineer in 1991, and spent his first nine years there working on Norton Utilities before making the transition to computer security. In 2001, Mark developed Symantec’s Script Blocking technology in response to Java Script and VB Script based threats, and presented a paper on it at Virus Bulletin. In 2002, Mark became the architect on the Anti-Virus engines, and moved to head up Symantec’s Behavior Blocking engines in 2004.
Gabor started antivirus work in 1995 and has been developing freeware antivirus solutions in his spare time. He also did on-contract work in developing the Virus ALERT for Macros product family. He was also an editor of a Hungarian magazine, Uj Alaplap, running the section “Virus Patrol”, until the magazine discontinued. He joined VirusBuster in 2001 where he was responsible for taking care of macro virus and script malware. Since 2002 he has been the head of the virus lab. He is a frequent speaker at antivirus conferences and has authored several articles on malware analysis. Since 2008 he is a member of the board of directors of AMTSO. Karel Obluk is the Chief Technology Officer of AVG Technologies. Karel graduated from Computer Science at the Brno University of Technology where he also received his Ph.D. in Computer Science. He started as a developer of proprietary database systems for a small local software vendor. His interest in fighting viruses dates back to 1989 when he first encountered Yankee Doodle on his PC. Karel joined GRISOFT (former name of AVG Technologies) in 2003 to lead development. Since 2005 he has held the role of CTO and for over a year he also served as an acting CEO. Karel lives in Brno, Czech republic.
In 2002 Andreas earned his BSc in Business Information Technology from the Otto-von-Guericke-University Magdeburg. In 2005 he received his diploma with a thesis about "Malware, Reference Models of Virus Scanners and Advanced Test Methods for Anti-Malware Products and Services (with a Focus on Retrospective and Response Time Tests)." Igor Muttik graduated from the Physics Department of Moscow State University in 1985. He then worked there in the Low Temperatures Physics Laboratory investigating doped semiconductors and high-Tc superconductors. Igor received his Ph.D. degree in physics and mathematics from Moscow University in 1989. He became interested in computer viruses in 1987 when PCs in the lab were infected with Cascade. Dr. Muttik has been a member of CARO since 1994. In 1995 he joined Dr.Solomon's Software in the UK as a Virus Researcher. Since 1998 he has been part of McAfee Avert(tm). In 1999 he headed the Avert Research laboratory in Aylesbury (UK) and Avert in Europe. Now Igor is Senior Avert Architect. He speaks regularly at security conferences. Igor lives in England with his wife Elena, 3 children, 3 cats and a hope that one day there will be decline in computer malware!
Roel Schouwenberg
Roel Schouwenberg is a Senior Anti-Virus Researcher with Kaspersky Lab.
Mark Kennedy
Throughout his tenure in the security industry, Mark has been increasingly concerned with method of testing security software. In May of 2007, Mark presented a paper on Dynamic Testing at the first CARO workshop in Iceland. Mark’s engagement with other AV Vendors and testers led to the formation of the AMTSO in Bilbao, Spain in January, 2008. Mark has been actively involved with AMTSO since its inception, and currently serves as a member of the AMTSO Review Analysis Board.
Gabor Szappanos
Gabor graduated from the Eotvos Lorand University of Budapest with a degree in physics. His first job was in the Computer and Automation Research Institute, developing diagnostic software and hardware for nuclear power plants.
Karel Obluk
Andreas Marx
Andreas Marx has been involved in the antivirus industry since 1991 and a WildList reporter since 1999. Andreas is currently the CEO of AV-Test GmbH where he has developed advanced methodologies for the testing of antivirus and security software. Andreas is also actively involved in virus analysis and security consultancy.
Igor Muttik
