Q&A: Symantec CEO On Split, New Security-Focused Channel Vision And Apple Vs. FBI

How does the Apple-FBI debate play into Symantec?

I would say that we take a balanced approach. That's an important tenet for us: strong encryption and strong privacy. We also support law enforcement. It's a little different mission than some of the other companies that are active in this debate. I view Symantec has having a dual mission. One is selling products and services to secure customers -- that's obvious. The other mission that we take very seriously is supporting law enforcement. We're often involved in some of the activity to take down criminal activity, whether it's botnets, or financial Trojans or ransomware. … We have very close relationships with the FBI, Europol, on and on, because part of our mission is to make the digital world a safer place. Doing that means we have to work closely with law enforcement. That doesn’t mean we would support backdoors or weak encryption, but we also want to have those collaborative relationships to go out and get bad guys. We are in a unique position and we think that does a lot of good for society.