Simple Nomad tracked John McAfee down thanks to GPS coordinates embedded in photo
Weeks of international intrigue about the whereabouts of tech millionaire John McAfee ended Tuesday after the internet pioneer made an elementary digital mistake that highlighted the fraught relationship Americans have with what they once quaintly called "the telephone".
McAfee, 67, who founded the popular antivirus company that bears his name, has been wanted for questioning by police in Belize since a neighbour turned up dead of a gunshot wound near McAfee's beachside home on November 11. The troubled tech savant, insisting that he had no role in the shooting, went on the run and has been taunting police by blog, Twitter and occasional podcast.
Authorities couldn't catch him. But a hacker called Simple Nomad learned McAfee's location shortly after journalists posted an image of him from his supposedly secret locale under the provocative headline: "We are with John McAfee right now, suckers." Embedded in that image, apparently taken by one of the journalists, was the sort of detailed data routinely collected by smartphone cameras and often transmitted along with images wherever they go - on email, Facebook, online photo albums and, it turns out, to Vice magazine's website.
