Stephen D. Crocker (born October 15, 1944) is the inventor of the Request for Comments series, authoring the first RFC and many more. He attended

Van Nuys High School Van Nuys High School (VNHS) is a public high school in the Van Nuys district of Los Angeles, belonging to the Los Angeles Unified School District: District 2. The school is home to a Residential Program and three Magnet Programs—Math/Science, P ...

, as did

Vint Cerf Vinton Gray Cerf (; 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 Bob Kahn. He has received honorary degrees and awards that include ...

and Jon Postel. Crocker received his

bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Middle Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate academic degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six ...

(1968) and PhD (1977) from the

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California S ...

. Crocker served as chair of the board of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) from 2011 through 2017. Steve Crocker has worked in the Internet community since its inception. As a UCLA graduate student in the 1960s, he was part of the team that developed the protocols for the ARPANET which were the foundation for today's

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

. For this work, Crocker was awarded the 2002 IEEE Internet Award. While at UCLA Crocker taught an extension course on computer programming (for the IBM 7094 mainframe computer). The class was intended to teach digital processing and assembly language programming to high school teachers, so that they could offer such courses in their high schools. A number of high school students were also admitted to the course, to ensure that they would be able to understand this new discipline. Crocker was also active in the newly formed UCLA Computer Club. Crocker has been a program manager at Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a senior researcher at USC's Information Sciences Institute, founder and director of the Computer Science Laboratory at

The Aerospace Corporation The Aerospace Corporation is an American nonprofit corporation that operates a federally funded research and development center (FFRDC) in El Segundo, California. The corporation provides technical guidance and advice on all aspects of space mi ...

and a vice president at Trusted Information Systems. In 1994, Crocker was one of the founders and chief technology officer of CyberCash, Inc. In 1998, he founded and ran Executive DSL, a DSL-based ISP. In 1999 he cofounded and was CEO of Longitude Systems. He is currently CEO of Shinkuro, a research and development company. Steve Crocker was instrumental in creating the ARPA "Network Working Group", which later was the context in which the IETF was created. He has also been an IETF security area director, a member of the

Internet Architecture Board The Internet Architecture Board (IAB) is "a committee of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and an advisory body of the Internet Society (ISOC). Its responsibilities include architectural oversight of IETF activities, Internet Standards ...

, chair of the ICANN Security and Stability Advisory Committee, board member and chairman of ICANN, a board member of the

Internet Society The Internet Society (ISOC) is an American nonprofit advocacy organization founded in 1992 with local chapters around the world. Its mission is "to promote the open development, evolution, and use of the Internet for the benefit of all people ...

and numerous other Internet-related volunteer positions. In 2012, Crocker was inducted into the

Internet Hall of Fame The Internet Hall of Fame is an honorary lifetime achievement award administered by the Internet Society (ISOC) in recognition of individuals who have made significant contributions to the development and advancement of the Internet.

by the

.2012 Inductees

website. Last accessed April 24, 2012

References

External links

* RFC 1, Host Software, S. Crocker, April 1969. * RFC 1776, The Address is the Message, S. Crocker, April 1, 1995.
Shinkuro.com executive team info

Oral history interview with Stephen Crocker

Charles Babbage Institute The IT History Society (ITHS) is an organization that supports the history and scholarship of information technology by encouraging, fostering, and facilitating archival and historical research. Formerly known as the Charles Babbage Foundation, ...

, University of Minnesota. Crocker discusses computer networks, artificial intelligence research, and his work at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA); interactions with other DARPA personnel including

Cordell Green Cordell Green (born 1941) is an American computer scientist who is the director and chief scientist of the Kestrel Institute. Green received a B.A. and B.S. from Rice University. At Stanford University, he earned an M.S. and then a PhD in 1969. ...

, Barry Wessler, Larry Roberts,

Bob Kahn Robert Elliot Kahn (born December 23, 1938) is an American electrical engineer who, along with Vint Cerf, first proposed the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP), the fundamental communication protocols at the hea ...

, and David Russell. He discusses his work as a program manager in the

Information Processing Techniques Office The Information Processing Techniques Office (IPTO), originally "Command and Control Research",Lyon, Matthew; Hafner, Katie (1999-08-19). ''Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins Of The Internet'' (p. 39). Simon & Schuster. Kindle Edition. was par ...

(IPTO). {{DEFAULTSORT:Crocker, Steve Computer systems researchers Living people 1944 births University of California, Los Angeles alumni Request for Comments Internet pioneers Van Nuys High School alumni

See also

References

External links