F-Secure acquires Jonathan Zdziarski's Mac security app Little Flocker, will continue to offer it rebranded as Xfence for download
Security researcher Jonathan Zdziarski revealed he was joining Apple earlier this month, and now it turns out his Mac security app, Little Flocker, has gone awol because it's joining F-Secure.
Context & Ripple Effects
Jonathan Zdziarski joined Apple's Security Engineering and Architecture team earlier this month, leaving his independently maintained Mac security tool without a maintainer. Rather than let it die, F-Secure has bought Little Flocker outright and will keep distributing it under a new name, Xfence.
The deal is an early move in what becomes a sustained acquisition run for F-Secure — from this small Mac endpoint tool to the roughly $106M-plus purchase of MWR InfoSecurity for proactive threat detection, and eventually the Lookout consumer mobile security business. Buying working products with installed user bases is the throughline.
First-order effects
- Little Flocker's existing Mac users get continuity instead of abandonment: the app keeps shipping as Xfence under F-Secure rather than stalling once Zdziarski moved to Apple.
Second-order effects
- F-Secure gains a beachhead in Mac endpoint protection at low cost, positioning it against platform vendors moving onto the same turf — Microsoft is already integrating third-party macOS security information into Windows Defender ATP.
Third-order effects
- The pattern echoes Apple's earlier absorption of firmware-security firm LegbaCore: when big companies hire the researchers behind niche Mac security tools, the tools themselves migrate to larger security vendors, thinning out the independent end of the market.
The trend: Mac security is consolidating around large vendors, as Apple hires away the independent researchers and firms like F-Secure acquire their tools to fill the gap.