Vladimir Kossobokov is Past Vice President of the IUGG Commission of Geophysical Risk and Sustainability with an MS in Mathematics, Department of Mechanics and Mathematics, Moscow State University gained in 1975. Months before graduation he joined Vladimir Keilis-Borok (at that time Professor at Institute of Physics of the Earth, USSR Academy of Sciences) to work on pattern recognition of highly earthquake-prone areas. Their fruitful collaboration lasted for decades, and since then Professor Kossobokov has played a pioneering role in design and testing reproducible methods for earthquake prediction, hazards, and risks assessment based on global and regional geophysical databases through exploratory data analysis, pattern recognition, and applied mathematical statistics. His fundamental contributions have led to formulation of the Unified Scaling Law for Earthquakes, with the launching in 1992 of the on-going real-time intermediate-term earthquake prediction experiment that eventually confirmed (with a statistical confidence above 99%) the predictability of the world’s largest earthquakes, a better understanding of climates in Europe, and solar–terrestrial interactions.