14 DAY TRIAL // On Monday, Kaspersky Labs accepted the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge from Mail.ru, a major provider of Internet services in Russia.
It was inevitable for the Ice Bucket Challenge to reach the security industry, only the Russians do it en masse, as a large group of Kaspersky employees soaked in ice-cold water, from head to toe.
Mind you, it was quite nippy outside, but despite this, some of the male employees did it with nothing then bathing suits on.
After the soaking was done, Kaspersky passed the dare to three other players: Ferrari, Symantec and Telefonica. They have to get cold in 24 hours or make a donation; it would be nice if they took option number two.
Although they got wet for the challenge, Kaspersky will also make a donation on behalf of all the team members in the video.
From Symantec, Matt Stephenson, community manager, Simon Jelley, VP of backup and recovery, and Pablo Stern, SVP of backup and recovery, completed the challenge before Kaspersky was called out, dared by Richard Melick from Webroot.
Other players in the security industry did the challenge as well, Mikko Hypponen from F-Secure throwing himself into the Baltic Sea after pouring the ice water on his head. The weather did not help in his case either, as a thunderstorm was in full swing at that moment.
Malwarebytes CEO Marcin Kleczynski was challenged too, and he completed the task, raising $5,000 / €3,800 for the cause.
The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge has been started by Boston College baseball player Pete Frates, who was diagnosed with ALS (Amyothrophic Lateral Sclerosis or Lou Gehrig's disease) at age 29. He decided to fight the disease, and in order to raise awareness, a few of his friends issued a challenge daring people to either donate money for the research or pour a bucket of ice-cold water on their head; or both.
Despite enjoying massive popularity this year, the challenge is a few years old. Acting as a chain-letter that reached a few celebrities (actors, singers, athletes), it tapped into a world-wide audience.
In the world of technology, Bill Gates accepted the dare made by Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, and created a platform for pouring the water.
Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella, was called out by former NFL player, Steve Gleason, and passed the challenge to Jeff Bezos and Larry Page, saying in the message that “it’s better to have your head in the clouds than under a bucket of ice.”
Kaspersky Lab, ALS Ice Bucket Challenge (from help4event):
Malwarebytes ALS Ice Bucket Challenge:
Mikko Hypponen, ALS Ice Bucket Challenge:
Matt Stephenson, ALS Ice Bucket Challenge:
