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Vint Cerf

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Vinton Gray Cerf (Template:IPAc-en; born June 23, 1943) is an American Internet pioneer and is recognized as one of "the fathers of the Internet", sharing this title with TCP/IP co-developer Robert Kahn.<ref name="vita" /><ref>(see Interview with Vinton Cerf Template:Webarchive, from a January 2006 article in Government Computer News), Cerf is willing to call himself one of the internet fathers, citing Robert Kahn and Leonard Kleinrock in particular as being others with whom he should share that title.</ref><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

He has received honorary degrees and awards that include the National Medal of Technology,<ref name="vita"/> the Turing Award,<ref name="turing">Cerf wins Turing Award February 16, 2005</ref> the Presidential Medal of Freedom,<ref name="whitehouse">2005 Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients from the White House website</ref> the Marconi Prize, and membership in the National Academy of Engineering.

Life and career

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File:Vint Cerf - 2010.jpg
Vinton Cerf in Vilnius, September 2010

Vinton Gray Cerf was born in New Haven, Connecticut, on June 23, 1943, the son of Muriel (née Gray) and Vinton Thruston Cerf.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> His mother was born in Canada and was of British, Irish, and French Canadian descent.<ref>Template:Cite interview</ref> His paternal ancestors emigrated from Alsace–Lorraine to Kentucky.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Cerf attended Van Nuys High School with Steve Crocker and Jon Postel. While in high school, Cerf worked at Rocketdyne on the Apollo program for six months and helped write statistical analysis software for the non-destructive tests of the F-1 engines.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Cerf received a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics from Stanford University.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> After college, Cerf worked at IBM as a systems engineer supporting QUIKTRAN for two years.<ref name="vita" />

Cerf and his wife Sigrid both have hearing deficiencies; they met at a hearing aid agent's practice in the 1960s,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> leading him to advocate for accessibility. They later joined a Methodist church and had two sons, David and Bennett.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

He left IBM to attend graduate school at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he earned his M.S. degree in 1970 and his PhD in 1972.<ref name="cerfphd" /><ref name="UCLAEngineering2005">Template:Cite web</ref> Cerf studied under Professor Gerald Estrin and worked in Professor Leonard Kleinrock's data packet networking group that connected the first two nodes of the ARPANET,<ref name="CNN1999_09_02">Template:Cite news</ref> the first node<ref name="CNN1999_09_02" /> on the Internet, and "contributed to a host-to-host protocol" for the ARPANET.<ref name="ACM2005_02_16" />

While at UCLA, Cerf met Bob Kahn, who was working on the ARPANET system architecture.<ref name="ACM2005_02_16">Template:Cite web</ref> Cerf chaired the International Network Working Group. He wrote the first TCP with Yogen Dalal and Carl Sunshine, called Specification of Internet Transmission Control Program (Template:IETF RFC), published in December 1974.<ref>Vinton Cerf, Yogen Dalal, Carl Sunshine, Specification of Internet Transmission Control Program (Template:IETF RFC, December 1974)</ref>

Cerf worked as assistant professor at Stanford University from 1972 to 1976 where he conducted research on packet network interconnection protocols and co-designed the DoD TCP/IP protocol suite with Kahn.<ref name="ACM2005_02_16" />

File:Vinton Cerf-20070512.jpg
Cerf playing Spacewar! on the Computer History Museum's PDP-1, ICANN meeting, 2007

From 1973 to 1982, Cerf worked at the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and funded various groups to develop TCP/IP, packet radio (PRNET), packet satellite (SATNET) and packet security technology.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> These efforts were rooted in the needs of the military.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite webTemplate:Cbignore</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> In the late 1980s, Cerf moved to MCI where he helped develop the first commercial email system (MCI Mail) to be connected to the Internet, in 1989.<ref name=":6">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Cerf is active in a number of global humanitarian organizations.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Cerf typically appears in a three-piece suit; a rarity in an industry known for its casual dress norms.<ref>"Internet pioneer Vint Cerf looks to the future", Todd Bishop, Seattle P-I, July 23, 2007. Retrieved September 27, 2013.</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

As vice president of MCI Digital Information Services from 1982 to 1986, Cerf led the engineering of MCI Mail, which became the first commercial email service to be connected to the Internet in 1989.<ref name=":6"/><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In 1986, he joined Bob Kahn at the Corporation for National Research Initiatives as its vice president, working with Kahn on Digital Libraries, Knowledge Robots, and gigabit speed networks. Since 1988 Cerf lobbied for the privatization of the internet.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> In 1992, he and Kahn, among others, founded the Internet Society (ISOC) to provide leadership in education, policy and standards related to the Internet. Cerf served as the first president of ISOC. Cerf rejoined MCI in 1994 and served as Senior Vice President of Technology Strategy. In this role, he helped to guide corporate strategy development from a technical perspective. Previously, he served as MCI's senior vice president of Architecture and Technology, leading a team of architects and engineers to design advanced networking frameworks, including Internet-based solutions for delivering a combination of data, information, voice and video services for business and consumer use.

During 1997, Cerf joined the board of trustees of Gallaudet University, a university for the education of the deaf and hard-of-hearing.<ref>Dr. Vinton G. Cerf Appointed to Gallaudet University's Board of Trustees Template:Webarchive, from that university's website</ref> Cerf himself is hard of hearing.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> He has also served on the university's Board of Associates.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Cerf, as leader of MCI's internet business, was criticized due to MCI's role in providing the IP addresses used by Send-Safe.com, a vendor of spamware that uses a botnet in order to send spam. MCI refused to terminate the spamware vendor.<ref name="spamcomplaintdraft">Template:Cite newsgroup</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> At the time, Spamhaus also listed MCI as the ISP with the most Spamhaus Block List listings.<ref>Template:Cite newsgroup</ref>

Cerf has worked for Google as a vice president and Chief Internet Evangelist since October 2005.<ref name="google"/> In this function he has become well known for his predictions on how technology will affect future society, encompassing such areas as artificial intelligence, environmentalism, the advent of IPv6 and the transformation of the television industry and its delivery model.<ref>The Daily Telegraph, August 2007</ref>

Cerf has served as a commissioner for the Broadband Commission for Digital Development, a UN body which aims to make broadband internet technologies more widely available<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Cerf helped fund and establish ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. He joined the board in 1999 and served until November 2007.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> He was chairman from November 2000 to his departure from the board.

Cerf was a member of Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov's IT Advisory Council (from March 2002 to January 2012). He is also a member of the advisory board of Eurasia Group, the political risk consultancy.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Cerf is also working on the Interplanetary Internet, together with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and other NASA laboratories. It will be a new standard to communicate from planet to planet, using radio/laser communications that are tolerant of signal degradations including variable delay and disruption caused, for example, by celestial motion.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

On February 7, 2006, Cerf testified before the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation's hearing on net neutrality. Speaking as Google's Chief Internet Evangelist, Cerf noted that nearly half of all US consumers lacked meaningful choice in broadband providers and expressed concerns that without network neutrality government regulation, broadband providers would be able to use their dominance to limit options for consumers and charge companies like Google for their use of bandwidth.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

File:VintCerfJI3.jpg
Cerf at 2007 Los Angeles ICANN meeting

Cerf currently serves on the board of advisors of Scientists and Engineers for America, an organization focused on promoting sound science in American government.<ref>SEA's Board of Advisors. sefora.org</ref> He also serves on the advisory council of CRDF Global (Civilian Research and Development Foundation) and was on the International Multilateral Partnership Against Cyber Threats (IMPACT) International Advisory Board.<ref>"Govt red tape adds to security threats" Template:Webarchive, Vivian Yeo, ZDNet, October 12, 2009</ref>

Cerf was elected as the president of the Association for Computing Machinery in May 2012<ref name="ACM">ACM Elects Vint Cerf as President Template:Webarchive from the ACM website</ref> and joined the Council on CyberSecurity's Board of Advisors in August 2013.<ref>"Advisory Board" Template:Webarchive, Council on CyberSecurity website. Retrieved September 27, 2013.</ref>

From 2011 to 2016, Cerf was chairman of the board of trustees of ARIN, the Regional Internet Registry (RIR) of IP addresses for the United States, Canada, and part of the Caribbean.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Until Fall 2015, Cerf chaired the board of directors of StopBadware, a non-profit anti-malware organization that started as a project at Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet & Society.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Cerf is on the board of advisors to The Liquid Information Company Ltd of the UK, which works to make the web more usefully interactive and which has produced the Mac OS X utility called 'Liquid'.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Vint Cerf is a member of the CuriosityStream Advisory Board.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

During 2008, Cerf chaired the Internationalized domain name (IDNAbis) working group of the IETF.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In 2008 Cerf was a major contender to be designated the first U.S. Chief Technology Officer by President Barack Obama.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Cerf is the co-chair of Campus Party Silicon Valley, the US edition of one of the largest technology festivals in the world, along with Al Gore and Tim Berners-Lee.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

From 2009 to 2011, Cerf was an elected member of the governing board of the Smart Grid Interoperability Panel (SGIP). SGIP is a public-private consortium established by NIST in 2009 and provides a forum for businesses and other stakeholder groups to participate in coordinating and accelerating development of standards for the evolving Smart Grid.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Cerf was elected to a two-year term as president of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) beginning July 1, 2012.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> On January 16, 2013, U.S. President Barack Obama announced his intent to appoint Cerf to the National Science Board.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Cerf served until May 2018 when his six-year term expired. In 2015 Cerf co-founded (with Mei Lin Fung) and until December 2019 chaired the People-Centered Internet (PCI).<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Cerf is also among the 15 members of governing council of International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In June 2016, his work with NASA led to delay-tolerant networking being installed on the International Space Station with an aim towards an Interplanetary Internet.<ref name="NASA">Template:Cite web</ref>

Since at least 2015, Cerf has been raising concerns about the wide-ranging risks of digital obsolescence, the potential of losing much historic information about our time – a digital "Dark Age" or "black hole" – given the ubiquitous digital storage of text, data, images, music and more. Among the concerns are the long-term storage of, and continued reliable access to, our vast stores of present-day digital data and the associated programs, operating systems, computers and peripherals required to access such.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Awards and honors

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File:CerfKahnMedalOfFreedom.jpg
Cerf and Bob E. Kahn being awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George W. Bush
File:CerfParvanov.jpg
Cerf and Bulgarian President Parvanov being awarded the St. Cyril and Methodius in the Coat of Arms Order

Cerf has received a number of honorary degrees, including doctorates, from the University of the Balearic Islands, ETHZ in Zurich, Switzerland, Capitol College, Gettysburg College, Yale University,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> George Mason University, Marymount University, Bethany College (Kansas), University of Pisa, University of Rovira and Virgili (Tarragona, Spain), Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Luleå University of Technology (Sweden), University of Twente (Netherlands), Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Tsinghua University (Beijing), Brooklyn Polytechnic, UPCT (University of Cartagena, Spain), Zaragoza University (Spain), University of Reading (United Kingdom), Royal Roads University (Canada), MGIMO (Moscow State University of International Relations), Buenos Aires Institute of Technology (Argentina), Polytechnic University of Madrid, Keio University (Japan), University of South Australia (Australia), University of St Andrews (Scotland), University of Pittsburgh and<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Gallaudet University (United States). Other awards include:

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Partial bibliography

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File:Vint Cerf ARO2017.jpg
Vint Cerf, before his talk in memory of Dr. John Niparko at the 2017 MidWinter Meeting of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology in Baltimore

Author

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Co-author

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  • Vinton Cerf, Robert Kahn, A Protocol for Packet Network Intercommunication (IEEE Transactions on Communications, May 1974)
  • Vinton Cerf, Yogen Dalal, Carl Sunshine, Specification of Internet Transmission Control Program (Template:IETF RFC, December 1974)
  • Vinton Cerf, Jon Postel, Mail transition plan (Template:IETF RFC, September 1980)
  • Vinton Cerf, K.L. Mills Explaining the role of GOSIP, Template:IETF RFC, August 1990
  • Clark, Chapin, Cerf, Braden, Hobby, Towards the Future Internet Architecture, Template:IETF RFC, December 1991
  • Vinton Cerf et al., A Strategic Plan for Deploying an Internet X.500 Directory Service, Template:IETF RFC, February 1993
  • Vinton Cerf & Bob Kahn, Al Gore and the Internet, 2000-09-28<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
  • Vinton Cerf et al., Internet Radio Communication System July 9, 2002, U.S. Patent 6,418,138
  • Vinton Cerf et al., System for Distributed Task Execution June 3, 2003, U.S. Patent 6,574,628
  • Vinton Cerf et al., Delay-Tolerant Networking Architecture (Informational Status), Template:IETF RFC, April 2007

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Cerf writes under the column name "CERF'S UP", and Cerf's car has a vanity plate (registration) "CERFSUP".<ref name="2018-08_ACM">Template:Cite journal)</ref>

See also

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References

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Further reading

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