Dancho Danchev: Missing cybersecurity expert

January 20, 2011

ZDNet ran an article recently:

Zero-day blogger and malware researcher Dancho Danchev has gone missing since August last year and we have some troubling information that suggests he may have been harmed in his native Bulgaria.

Dancho, who was relentless in his pursuit of cyber-criminals, last blogged here on August 18. His personal blog has not been updated since September 11, 2010.

Dancho possibly found: Bulgarian news relates

Latest news contributed by cyber guru Joel Harding leads to this Bulgarian newspaper article [Google Translation] where it states that Dancho will be released in four to six weeks from a psychiatric hospital.

Dancho Danchev, an expert on cybersecurity, is placed in a psychiatric hospital in Bulgaria. The information was confirmed by two sources of "Dnevnik," although the hospital refused comment.

Reading the comments on several user groups, the cybersecurity world seems skeptical, regardless of the root language.

After all, even if he is there for being mentally sick, show me please a single mainstream journalist outside of Bulgaria and former Soviet block who wouldn't want to make a story about intelligence services and bad KGB out of that. I mean it's a whole real Lizbeth Salander Girl with a Dragon Tattoo story almost ready for publication!

Admission to a psychiatric hospital is indeed discrediting for most professionals; however, it seems that admission without Dancho's closest business associates knowing from friends or family stretches the credibility for most of us in the cybersecurity world. I personally wish him well and we'll all feel better if he rehabilitates outside of Bulgaria.