hidden pixel

Clifford Stoll Information

Clifford Stoll (or Cliff Stoll) is a U.S. astronomer and author. He received his Ph.D. from University of Arizona in 1980. He is best known for his pursuit of hacker Markus Hess in 1986 and the subsequent 1989 book detailing his investigation. Stoll has authored a total of three books as well as technology articles in the non-specialist press (e.g., in Scientific American on the Curta mechanical calculator and the slide rule).

Contents

Life and career

During the 1960s and '70s, Stoll was assistant chief engineer[1] at WBFO, a public radio station in Buffalo, New York, where he was born and raised.

In 1986 Stoll investigated hacker Markus Hess while employed as a systems administrator at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. After identifying the intrusion he set up a honeypot for Hess, eventually tracking him down and passing details to the authorities. It is recognised as one of the first examples of digital forensics, at the time gaining co-operation from law enforcement was a challenge due to the relatively new nature of the crime.[2] He described the events of his investigation in The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage and the paper "Stalking the Wily Hacker".[3] Stoll's book was later chronicled in an episode of WGBH's NOVA titled "The KGB, the Computer, and Me" which aired on PBS stations in 1990.

One of Stoll's Klein bottles

In his 1995 book, Silicon Snake Oil,[4] and an accompanying article in Newsweek[5] Stoll called the prospect of e-commerce "baloney", and raised questions about the influence of the Internet on future society and whether it would be beneficial. Along the way, he made various predictions, e.g. about e-commerce (calling it nonviable due to a lack of personal contact and secure online funds transfers) and the future of printed news publications ("no online database will replace your daily newspaper").

Stoll has sold blown glass Klein bottles on the Web, and his web site is currently accepting orders.[6][7] As of 2000[update], he is "mostly" a stay-at-home dad.[6] He taught eighth graders about physics at Tehiyah Day School, in El Cerrito, California,[8] and later taught physics to home-schooled teenagers.[9] Stoll was a regular contributor to MSNBC's The Site. Stoll is an FCC licensed amateur radio operator, callsign K7TA.[10]

Bibliography

Notes and references

  1. ^ WBFO Alumni
  2. ^ Simson L. Garfinkel (August 2010). "Digital forensics research: The next 10 years". Digital Investigation 7: S64-S73. doi:10.1016/j.diin.2010.05.009. ISSN 1742-2876.
  3. ^ Clifford Stoll (May 1988). Stalking the wily Hacker. 31. Association for Computing Machinery.
  4. ^ Clifford Stoll (1995). Silicon Snake Oil. McMillan. ISBN 0-330-34442-0.
  5. ^ Clifford Stoll: The Internet? Bah! Newsweek, February 27, 1995
  6. ^ a b Stoll's Home page at Berkeley's Open Computing Facility
  7. ^ Klein bottles by Cliff Stoll
  8. ^ Clifford Stoll: Clifford Stoll on Everything - 18 minutes with an Agile mind. TED conference February 2006
  9. ^ [1]
  10. ^ Stoll's callsign at QRZ.com

External links

Persondata
Name Stoll, Clifford
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth
Place of birth
Date of death
Place of death

Categories: American astronomers | American technology writers | American non-fiction crime writers | Internet critics | University of Arizona alumni | Amateur radio people | People from Buffalo, New York | Living people | Digital forensics people | People associated with computer security

 

The above information uses material from Wikipedia and is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Some facts may not have been fully verified for accuracy. [Disclaimers]
This page was last archived by our server on Thu May 26 22:56:04 2011.
Displaying this page or its contents does not use any Wikimedia Foundation's resources.
The owners of this site proudly support the Wikimedia Foundation.

More Information Results for "Clifford Stoll"
[Hide]▼
'Clifford Stoll' Images
[Hide]▲