Journalist Misha Glenny leaves no stone unturned (and no failed state unexamined) in his excavation of criminal globalization.

Why you should listen

In minute detail, Misha Glenny's 2008 book McMafia illuminates the byzantine outlines of global organized crime. Whether it's pot smugglers in British Columbia, oil/weapons/people traffickers in Eastern Europe, Japanese yakuza or Nigerian scammers, to research this magisterial work Glenny penetrated the convoluted, globalized and franchised modern underworld -- often at considerable personal risk.

The book that resulted is an exhaustive look at an unseen industry that Glenny believes may account for 15% of the world's GDP.

Legal society ignores this world at its peril, but Glenny suggests that conventional law enforcement might not be able to combat a problem whose roots lie in global instability.

While covering the Central Europe beat for the Guardian and the BBC, Glenny wrote several acclaimed books on the fall of Yugoslavia and the rise of the Balkan nations. He's researching a new book on cybercrime, of which he says: "The key to cybercrime is what we call social engineering. Or to use the technical term for it, there's one born every minute."

Watch TED's exclusive video Q&A with Glenny: "Behind the Scenes of McMafia" >>

What others say

“Glenny is not afraid to put himself in threatening situations -- one imagines his name is conspicuously absent from the Christmascard list of the world's major criminals.” — The Observer

Misha Glenny’s TED talks

More news and ideas from Misha Glenny

Live from TEDGlobal

Sideways solutions and inverted explanations: A recap of session 10 of TEDGlobal 2014

October 9, 2014

The thinkers in this session, “Lateral Action,” don’t go about creating change in the usual ways. Here, their unexpected approaches: Argentinian singer-songwriter Juana Molina opens the session with a hypnotizing performance on the electric guitar and a rack of pedals that layer sounds into gorgeously complex song structures. Singing calmly behind layers of chords, she mixes […]

Continue reading
Live from TEDGlobal

Lateral Action: A sneak peek of session 10 at TEDGlobal 2014

October 9, 2014

Real solutions can emerge from places surprisingly adjacent to the problems they address. This session examines how progress — from villages to urban spaces, from the artist’s studio to the corporate world — can be found by taking a step to the side. The speakers who’ll appear in this session: Khalida Brohi found an unexpected way to fight […]

Continue reading