Vinton G. Cerf has served as vice president and chief
Internet evangelist for Google since October 2005. In this role, he is
responsible for identifying new enabling technologies to support the
development of advanced, Internet-based products and services from Google. He
is also an active public face for Google in the Internet world.
Cerf is the former senior vice president of Technology
Strategy for MCI. In this role, Cerf was responsible for helping to guide
corporate strategy development from the technical perspective. Previously, Cerf
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.
Widely known as one of the "Fathers of the
Internet," Cerf is the co-designer of the TCP/IP protocols and the
architecture of the Internet.
In December 1997, President Clinton presented the U.S. National Medal of
Technology to Cerf and his colleague, Robert E. Kahn, for founding and
developing the Internet. Kahn and Cerf were named the recipients of the ACM
Alan M. Turing award in 2004 for their work on the Internet protocols. The
Turing award is sometimes called the “Nobel Prize of Computer Science.” In
November 2005, President George Bush awarded Cerf and Kahn the Presidential
Medal of Freedom for their work. The medal is the highest civilian award given
by the United States to its citizens. In April 2008, Cerf and Kahn received the
prestigious Japan Prize.
Prior to rejoining MCI in 1994, Cerf was vice president of
the Corporation for National Research Initiatives (CNRI). As vice president of MCI Digital
Information Services from 1982-1986, he led the engineering of MCI Mail, the
first commercial email service to be connected to the Internet.
During his tenure from 1976-1982 with the U.S. Department of
Defense's Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Cerf played a key role
leading the development of Internet and Internet-related packet data and
security technologies.
Vint Cerf served as chairman of the board of the Internet
Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) from 2000-2007. Cerf also
served as founding president of the Internet Society from 1992-1995 and in 1999
served a term as chairman of the Board. In addition, Cerf is honorary chairman of the IPv6
Forum, dedicated to raising awareness and speeding introduction of the new
Internet protocol. Cerf served as
a member of the U.S. Presidential Information Technology Advisory Committee
(PITAC) from 1997 to 2001 and serves on several national, state and industry
committees focused on cyber-security.
Cerf sits on the Board of Directors for the Endowment for Excellence in
Education, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory Advisory Committee and serves as Chair
of the Visitors Committee on
Advanced Technology of the U.S. National Institute of Standards and
Technology. He also serves as 1st
Vice President and Treasurer of the National Science & Technology Medals
Foundation. Cerf is a Fellow of the IEEE, ACM, and American Association for the
Advancement of Science, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the
International Engineering Consortium, the Computer History Museum, the
Annenberg Center for Communications at USC, the Swedish Royal Academy of Engineering, the American
Philosophical Society and the US National Academy of Engineering.
Cerf is a recipient of numerous awards and commendations in
connection with his work on the Internet.
These include the Marconi Fellowship, Charles Stark Draper award of the
National Academy of Engineering, the Prince of Asturias award for science and
technology, the National Medal of Science from Tunisia, the St. Cyril and St.
Methodius Order (Grand Cross) of Bulgaria, the Alexander Graham Bell Award
presented by the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf, the NEC
Computer and Communications Prize, the Silver Medal of the International
Telecommunications Union, the IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal, the IEEE Koji
Kobayashi Award, the ACM Software and Systems Award, the ACM SIGCOMM Award, the
Computer and Communications Industries Association Industry Legend Award,
installation in the Inventors Hall of Fame, the Yuri Rubinsky Web Award, the
Kilby Award , the Rotary Club International Paul P. Harris Medal, the Joseph
Priestley Award from Dickinson College, the Yankee Group/Interop/Network World
Lifetime Achievement Award, the
George R. Stibitz Award, the Werner Wolter Award, the Andrew Saks Engineering
Award, the IEEE Third Millennium Medal, the Computerworld/Smithsonian
Leadership Award, the J.D. Edwards Leadership Award for Collaboration, World
Institute on Disability Annual award
and the Library of Congress Bicentennial Living Legend medal. Cerf was inducted into the National
Inventors Hall of Fame in May 2006. He was made an Eminent Member of the IEEE
Eta Kappa Nu (HKN) honor society of the IEEE in 2009.
In December, 1994, People
magazine identified Cerf as one of that year's "25 Most Intriguing
People."
In addition to his work on behalf of Google and the
Internet, Cerf has served as a technical advisor to production for "Gene
Roddenberry's Earth: Final Conflict" and made a special guest appearance
on the program in May 1998. Cerf has appeared on television programs NextWave
with Leonard Nimoy and often co-hosted World Business Review with Alexander
Haig and Caspar Weinberger. Cerf also holds an appointment as distinguished
visiting scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory where he is working on the
design of an interplanetary Internet.
Cerf holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematics from
Stanford University and Master of Science and Ph.D. degrees in Computer Science
from UCLA. He also holds
honorary Doctorate degrees from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology
(ETH), Zurich; Lulea University of Technology, Sweden; University of the Balearic
Islands, Palma; Capitol College, Maryland; Gettysburg College, Pennsylvania;
George Mason University, Virginia;
Rovira i Virgili University, Tarragona, Spain; Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute, Troy, New York; the University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands;
Brooklyn Polytechnic; Marymount
University; the University of Pisa; the Beijing University of Posts and
Telecommunications;Tschingua University, Beijing, China; the University of
Zaragoza, Spain; the Technical
University of Cartagena, Spain; the Polytechnic University of Madrid, Spain;
and Bethany College, Kansas.
His personal interests include fine wine, gourmet cooking
and science fiction. Cerf and his wife, Sigrid, were married in 1966 and have
two sons, David and Bennett.
