Jordan groups and automorphism groups of algebraic varieties

This is the expanded version of my talk at the workshop "Groups of Automorphisms in Birational and Affine Geometry", October 29--November 3, 2012, Levico Terme, Italy. The first section is focused on Jordan groups in abstract setting, the second on that in the settings of automorphisms groups and groups of birational self-maps of algebraic varieties. The appendix is the expanded version of my notes on open problems posted on the site of this workshop. It contains formulations of some open problems and the relevant comments.