18 Facts About Caspar Bowden

Caspar Pemberton Scott Bowden was a British privacy advocate, formerly a chief privacy adviser at Microsoft.

Caspar Bowden dropped out and worked as an independent entrepreneur in technology before joining Goldman Sachs.

Caspar Bowden served on the Executive Committee of Scientists for Labour and helped shape the stance of the Labour Party on the matter.

Caspar Bowden became its first director, earning the Winston award in 2000 for his work against the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000.

In 2002, Caspar Bowden joined Microsoft; he served as a Senior Privacy Strategist for Europe, the Middle East and Africa until 2004, and became a Chief Privacy Advisor, Microsoft EMEA Technology Office, UK in 2005.

In 2013, Caspar Bowden authored the 2013 European Parliament inquiry briefing on the US FISA law, The US surveillance programmes and their impact on EU citizens' fundamental rights, In an interview to The Guardian, he stated that he did not trust Microsoft.

Caspar Bowden was survived by his wife Sandi, and brothers Malcolm and Simon.

Jacob Appelbaum reported that on his deathbed, Caspar Bowden asked "that we work to ensure equal protection regardless of nationality".

Caspar Bowden was posthumously awarded the Liberty Lifetime Achievement Award and EFF Pioneer Award.

Caspar Bowden was a big believer in a Rawlsian model of justice, a stickler when it came to the universality of human rights and was unstinting in his criticism of corporate or government entities or agents who sought to undermine those rights and principles.

Caspar Bowden was prepared to wrestle with the user unfriendly inconveniences of privacy enhancing technologies, as the almost meltdown of his laptop, four minutes into his 'Reflections on Mistrusting Trust' talk at QCon last summer, demonstrated.

Caspar Bowden hacked legislation to see what it was that governments were trying to do and called them on it, was then labelled paranoid, until proven right down the road.

Caspar Bowden would have been the intellectual powerhouse and a forceful critic of all who fell short in the defense of privacy.

Caspar Bowden was tireless, fierce, and had an encyclopedic knowledge of privacy legislation, regulation, and technology.

Caspar Bowden went to Microsoft for a while to be their main privacy advocate, beat his brains out on that gig, walked out with his head held high, and went back to shit-disturbing for activist groups.

Caspar Bowden boycotted conferences he'd urged me to attend on grounds that the sponsors were evil.

Caspar Bowden could be brilliant on stage and a troll when in the audience, banging on about US exceptionalism and FISA.

Caspar Bowden argued with everyone: "Prickly for the right reasons," a friend said on hearing the news.