Oral History Interview with Steven M. Bellovin

Abstract

This oral history interview is sponsored by and a part of NSF 2202484 “Mining a Useable Past: Perspectives, Paradoxes, and Possibilities with Security and Privacy,” at the Charles Babbage Institute, University of Minnesota. It is an interview with Percy K. and Vida L. W. Hudson Professor of Computer Science, and affiliate faculty member of the Law School Steven M. Bellovin, Columbia University, a pioneer and expert in security as well as a leading scholar in technology and law. The interview starts with Bellovin’s recollections of his pre-college and college education and how he encountered programming. He then discusses his graduate education, his mentors and professors—Fred Brooks, David Parnas, and Brian Kernighan—and their influences on him. Bellovin briefly describes and summarizes contexts to his dissertation in formal methods, “Verifiable Correct Code Generation Using Predicate Transformers.” Then the interview shifts to focus on USENET during his graduate school days and beyond. This includes sharing his thoughts on the personal computer revolution, democratizing computing, important concepts growing out of USENET such as “flame,” “sock puppet,” “trolling,” “spam,” “FAQ.” Bellovin offers context to his joining AT&T Labs and his professional focus on computer security research. He shares the context of Morris Worm, as well as the origin of cryptographic authentication, the idea of firewalls, and his work serving on the Internet Engineering Task Force or the IETF. He discusses joining Columbia University and his research and teaching. The latter part of the interview focuses on his growing focus on technology and law.