#ryan mcgeehan

Facebook Security Director, Amazon BD Director Join Bitcoin Startup Coinbase

By Alex Wilhelm, Techcrunch.com

Ryan McGeehan has recently announced on Facebook, fittingly, that he is leaving his role at Facebook as its Director of Security Incident Response, and taking up a security-related role at Coinbase.

His job, according to his posting, will be to “build [Coinbase's] security program.”

Another senior Amazon director, Todd Edebohls, is also joining the company as its new vice president of business development.

After the world’s former leading Bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox filed for bankruptcy, the entire Bitcoin ecosystem has entered yet another period of doubt and uncertainty. Mt. Gox, which posted roughly $400 million in losses, instigated new concerns that companies built around the crypto-currency aren’t trustworthy.

Coinbase Hires Big Names From Amazon and Facebook to Bolster Security and Business Development

By Daniel Cawrey, Coindesk.com

Coinbase is adding some notable technology veterans to its team, it says.

The new faces at the company – former Facebook security director Ryan McGeehan and Todd Edebohls, Amazon’s former director of business development & sales – will bring with them extensive experience in the areas of security and business development.

When asked for comment, the San Francisco-based company issued a statement regarding the new team members, which have yet to be formally announced:

Coinbase hires Facebook’s Security Manager Ryan McGeehan

Coinbase hires Facebook’s Security Manager Ryan McGeehan

San Francisco-based Coinbase has brought Facebook’s security director, Ryan McGeehan on board to beef up its security.

  With the recent MtGox disaster that has lost investors 750,000 Bitcoins worth hundreds of millions of dollars apparently due to malleability related theft, Coinbase has invited the head of security for Blockchain.info,…

I met Steve at Whole Foods and got 5 minutes of chat out of him. I was checking out and was tapped on the shoulder. I was asked where I got the lemonade I was checking out with. I pointed to the back of the store and told him where I found it. As he turned around I said something bro'ish like "this stuff rules and you should go get some" and he laughed a bit. About now I made eye contact with him. In hindsight he knew what was about to happen, because he started nodding as soon as I started saying "You kind of look like Steve Jo...". Right about here he is grinning, almost implying that I should spit it out. "I guess you're Steve Jobs. I'm Ryan, I work at Facebook."

Then I shook his hand and let a chat flow, ready to leave him alone if it seemed I was getting on his nerves. Not so interesting, but this is a pretty rough description of what happened next. He asked what I do for Facebook. I told him I deal with "Internet Bad Guys" and he mentioned that Apple's got some good folks that "deal with that too".