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Misha Glenny speaker

Misha Glenny

Authority on geopolitics and cybersecurity, journalist and bestselling author
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About

Gender: Male
Nationality: United Kingdom
Languages: English
Travels from: United Kingdom

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Biography Highlights

  • Renowned BBC journalist and Rector of the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna, with expertise in geopolitics and cyber security.
  • Author of internationally acclaimed books McMafia, DarkMarket, and Nemesis, with McMafia adapted into a hit BBC–AMC television series.
  • Host of top-ranking podcasts and BBC Radio series exploring global crime, politics, and technology, including Putin: Prisoner of Power and The Rise of the Iron Men.

Biography

Misha Glenny is an award-winning journalist who made a name for himself as the BBC’s Central Europe Correspondent covering the 1989 revolutions and the wars in the former Yugoslavia. An expert in geo-politics and cyber-security, Misha is currently the Rector of the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna (one of Central Europe’s leading advanced research bodies.)

A regular contributor on TV and radio, Misha has a Sony Gold Award for Outstanding Contribution to Broadcasting and is also a winner of BT’s Information Security Journalist of The Year. Misha’s new 5-part series on the global race for control of rare earth metals will air on BBC Radio 4 this year.

His book McMafia: Seriously Organised Crime and DarkMarket: How Hackers Became the New Mafia were shortlisted for several prizes, and McMafia has been adapted in a joint production between AMC (in the US) and the BBC into a major television series that has recently been commissioned for a second season.

His most recent book, Nemesis: One Man and the Battle for Rio, is the biography of the former head of a major Brazilian cocaine cartel who Misha interviewed at length in prison. Nemesis is also in development as a television drama series.

Misha’s series Putin: Prisoner of Power was one of Audible’s best-selling politics podcasts in 2019 as was his 2020 follow up, The Rise of the Iron Men, looking at the surge in support for Trump, Johnson, Orban, Erdogan, Bolsonaro, Modi and Duterte.

Misha can speak on all aspects of organised crime, from money laundering to cyber malfeasance, people smuggling and the drugs trade. He has unique insights into how new technology is reshaping traditional organised crime in the narcotics, smuggling and sex trades. He also draws on his background in geopolitics to show how great power relations are driving insecurity in cyberspace, and why companies cannot rely on government to shore-up their vulnerabilities.

Misha is currently writing a new book, The Cobra Effect: A History of the Present, in which he will explain exactly why our present is so turbulent, looking back over the past century in which he has met and discussed the world with many of its key players.

He is also developing a major new drama series, Amazonia, which plays out against one of the biggest dramas of all – the deforestation of the Amazon.

Videos

Popular Talks

While the pandemic has slowed most things down, cyber-attacks and geo-political tensions have been rising steeply. In this brand new talk, Misha Glenny offers unique insights into the challenges which geo-political tensions are creating across the tech sector and specifically in the sphere of cyber security. With this usual mix of video, stunning animation and original graphics, Misha tells you what need to know about the US, Russia, China, Europe, Israel and Iran in order to keep yourself more secure.

Available: In person, Virtually

Misha exposes cyber threats to businesses while arguing that high-tech digital solutions are only part of the solution. Every member of an organisation, from top to bottom, needs to understand their role in maintaining good cyber hygiene.

Available: In person, Virtually

Why are central governments so terrified of cryptocurrencies? And just what are blockchain, bitcoin and Web 3.0 anyway? Misha explains all this and more in an illuminating talk that takes us on a journey through the darker side of these technologies and their implications for you, your company and the world at large.

Available: In person, Virtually

From the Russian mafia to the Latin American drug cartels, Misha explains how the extraordinary growth of global organised crime – which began in the early 1990s – was triggered by the liberalisation of money markets and the fall of communism in Eastern Europe. His keynotes include some jaw-dropping anecdotes gathered from talking not just to intelligence and law enforcement officials, but to the criminals themselves.

Available: In person, Virtually

Why have so many critical democracies elected strongmen leaders who aim to change the rules of the democratic game? In a tour de force, Misha looks behind the extraordinary personalities now reshaping our world to explain the underlying trends driving their success and whether their success will be sustained. He answers the question as to whether we are now seeing the sun setting on the very idea of liberal democracy.

Available: In person, Virtually

Books

McMafia - A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld

McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld

With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the deregulation of international financial markets in 1989, governments and entrepreneurs alike became intoxicated by dreams of newly opened markets. But no one could have foreseen that the greatest success story to arise from these events would be the worldwide rise of organized crime. Today, it is estimated that illegal trade accounts for one-fifth of the global GDP.

Read more..

McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld

With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the deregulation of international financial markets in 1989, governments and entrepreneurs alike became intoxicated by dreams of newly opened markets. But no one could have foreseen that the greatest success story to arise from these events would be the worldwide rise of organized crime. Today, it is estimated that illegal trade accounts for one-fifth of the global GDP.
Buy the book
Buy the book
The Balkans, 1804-2012 - Nationalism, War and the Great Powers

The Balkans, 1804-2012: Nationalism, War and the Great Powers

In this celebrated, landmark history of the Balkans, Misha Glenny investigates the roots of the bloodshed, invasions and nationalist fervour that have come to define our understanding of the south-eastern edge of Europe. In doing so, he reveals that groups we think of as implacable enemies have, over the centuries, formed unlikely alliances, thereby disputing the idea that conflict in the Balkans is the ineluctable product of ancient grudges. And he exposes the often-catastrophic relationship between the Balkans and the rest of Europe, raising profound questions about recent Western intervention.

Read more..

The Balkans, 1804-2012: Nationalism, War and the Great Powers

In this celebrated, landmark history of the Balkans, Misha Glenny investigates the roots of the bloodshed, invasions and nationalist fervour that have come to define our understanding of the south-eastern edge of Europe. In doing so, he reveals that groups we think of as implacable enemies have, over the centuries, formed unlikely alliances, thereby disputing the idea that conflict in the Balkans is the ineluctable product of ancient grudges. And he exposes the often-catastrophic relationship between the Balkans and the rest of Europe, raising profound questions about recent Western intervention.
Buy the book
Buy the book
Nemesis - One Man and the Battle for Rio

Nemesis: One Man and the Battle for Rio

How did Antônio Francisco Bonfim Lopes, a hardworking young father, become the king of Rocinha, the largest slum in Rio; the head of a drug cartel; and perhaps Brazil’s most wanted criminal, known to all as “Nem”? Nemesis is the riveting account of his ruthless ascent in Rio’s terrifying underworld, his sway over its anarchic outlaw culture, and his accidental fall. Nem tried to bring welfare and justice to a playground of gang culture and destitution, but he quickly found himself embroiled in a world of gold hunters and evangelical pastors, bent police officers and rich-kid addicts, quixotic politicians and drug lords with math degrees.

Read more..

Nemesis: One Man and the Battle for Rio

How did Antônio Francisco Bonfim Lopes, a hardworking young father, become the king of Rocinha, the largest slum in Rio; the head of a drug cartel; and perhaps Brazil’s most wanted criminal, known to all as “Nem”? Nemesis is the riveting account of his ruthless ascent in Rio’s terrifying underworld, his sway over its anarchic outlaw culture, and his accidental fall. Nem tried to bring welfare and justice to a playground of gang culture and destitution, but he quickly found himself embroiled in a world of gold hunters and evangelical pastors, bent police officers and rich-kid addicts, quixotic politicians and drug lords with math degrees.
Buy the book
Buy the book
DarkMarket - How Hackers Became the New Mafia

DarkMarket: How Hackers Became the New Mafia

The benefits of living in a digital, globalized society are enormous; so too are the dangers. The world has become a law enforcer’s nightmare and every criminal’s dream. We bank online; shop online; date, learn, work and live online. But have the institutions that keep us safe on the streets learned to protect us in the burgeoning digital world? Have we become complacent about our personal security—sharing our thoughts, beliefs and the details of our daily lives with anyone who might care to relieve us of them?

Read more..

DarkMarket: How Hackers Became the New Mafia

The benefits of living in a digital, globalized society are enormous; so too are the dangers. The world has become a law enforcer’s nightmare and every criminal’s dream. We bank online; shop online; date, learn, work and live online. But have the institutions that keep us safe on the streets learned to protect us in the burgeoning digital world? Have we become complacent about our personal security—sharing our thoughts, beliefs and the details of our daily lives with anyone who might care to relieve us of them?
Buy the book
Buy the book

Speaker Bureaus and Talent Agencies

Misha Glenny is available to book via these agencies
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Speaking Office Ltd.
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Speakers Associates
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