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After 33 years, Bernardo Quintero decided it was time to find the person who changed his life \u2014 the anonymous programmer who created a computer virus that had infected his university decades earlier.<\/p>\n
The virus, called Virus M\u00e1laga<\/a>, was mostly harmless. But the challenge of defeating it sparked Quintero\u2019s passion for cybersecurity, eventually leading him to found VirusTotal<\/a>, a startup that Google acquired<\/a> in 2012. That acquisition brought Google\u2019s flagship European cybersecurity center to M\u00e1laga, transforming the Spanish city into a tech hub.<\/p>\n All because of a small malware program created by someone whose identity Quintero had never known. Moved by nostalgia and gratitude, Quintero launched a search earlier this year. He asked Spanish media outlets to amplify his quest for tips. He dove back into the virus\u2019s code, looking for clues his 18-year-old self might have missed. And he eventually solved the mystery, sharing the bittersweet resolution in a LinkedIn post<\/a> that went viral.<\/p>\n The story begins in 1992, when a young Quintero was prompted by a teacher to create an antivirus for the 2610-byte program that had spread across the computers of M\u00e1laga\u2019s Polytechnic School. \u201cThat challenge in my first year at university sparked a deep interest in computer viruses and security, and without it my path might have been very different,\u201d Quintero told TechCrunch.<\/p>\n Quintero\u2019s search was aided by his programmer instincts. Earlier this year, he stepped down<\/a> from his team manager role to \u201cgo back to the cave, to the basement of Google.\u201d He didn\u2019t leave the company; instead, he went back to tinkering and experimenting<\/a> without managerial duties.<\/p>\n That tinkering mindset also led him to reexamine Virus M\u00e1laga and look for details he\u2019d missed years earlier. First, he found fragments of a signature, but thanks to another security expert, he discovered a later variant of the virus with a much clearer cue: \u201cKIKESOYYO.\u201d \u201cKike soy yo\u201d would translate to \u201cI am Kike,\u201d a common nickname for \u201cEnrique.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Around the same time, Quintero received a direct message from a man who is now the general digital transformation coordinator for the Spanish city of Cordoba and who claimed he witnessed one of his Polytechnic School classmates create the virus. Many details added up, but one stood out in particular: the man knew that the virus\u2019s hidden message \u2014 called a payload, in cybersecurity terms \u2014 was a statement condemning the Basque terrorist group ETA, a fact that Quintero had never disclosed.<\/p>\n Techcrunch event<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSan Francisco<\/span> The tipster then gave Quintero a name \u2014 Antonio Astorga \u2014 but also shared the news that he had passed away.\u00a0<\/p>\n This hit Quintero like a ton of bricks; now, he would never be able to ask Antonio about \u201cKike.\u201d But he kept following the thread, and the plot twist came from Antonio\u2019s sister, who revealed that his first name was actually Antonio Enrique. To his family, he was Kike.<\/p>\n Cancer took away Antonio Enrique Astorga before Quintero could thank him in person, but the story doesn\u2019t stop here. Quintero\u2019s LinkedIn post sheds new light to the legacy of \u201ca brilliant colleague who deserves to be recognized as a pioneer of cybersecurity in M\u00e1laga\u201d \u2014 and not just for helping Quintero discover his vocation.<\/p>\n According to his friend, Astorga\u2019s virus had no other goal than spreading his anti-terrorist message and proving himself as a programmer. Mirroring Quintero\u2019s path, Astorga\u2019s interest in IT endured, and he became a computing teacher at a secondary school that named its IT classroom after him in his memory.\u00a0<\/p>\n Astorga\u2019s legacy also lives on beyond these walls, and not just through his students. One of his sons, Sergio, is a recent software engineering graduate with an interest in cybersecurity and quantum computing \u2014 a meaningful connection for Quintero. \u201cBeing able to close that circle now, and to see new generations building on it, is deeply meaningful to me,\u201d Quintero said.<\/p>\n For Quintero, who suspects their paths will cross again, Sergio is \u201cvery representative of the talent being formed in M\u00e1laga today.\u201d This, in turn, is a result of VirusTotal forming the root of what eventually became the Google Safety Engineering Center<\/a> (GSEC<\/a>) and spearheading collaborations with the University of M\u00e1laga that made the city a true cybersecurity talent hub.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOctober 13-15, 2026<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n