Dr. Vinton Cerf recently gave the keynote at the inaugural Future Worlds Symposium which was held at the Sacramento City Hall. Dr. Cerf is recognized as one of the fathers of the Internet. In 1973, he along with Robert E. Kahn are credited with developing TCP/IP which are the protocols that form the basis of the Internet.
Dr. Cerf’s presentation was entitled the “Desirable Properties of an IoT Ecosystem.” In his presentation, he lists the desirable properties of Internet of Things devices:
- Reliability: Don’t want high probability of working
- Safety: Won’t use if not safe
- Security: Won’t use if appears insecure
- Privacy: won’t use if privacy is likely to be breached
- Interoperability: won’t use if it cannot interoperate between brands
- Autonomy: won’t use if it fails when Internet is down.
The main thing that Dr. Cerf stressed is that IoT device makers need to focus on security, citing the massive denial of service attack that leverage IoT devices in 2016 that was a result of poor security.
In the Q&A moderated by the City of Sacramento’s Chief Innovation Officer, Louis Stewart, Dr. Cerf made the following comments:
- In regards to the skills needed for a modern work force, he stated that basic math skills are essential. In addition, critical thinking is also paramount – citing the ability to sort through misinformation as an example. In addition, because technology is constantly changing, people need to constantly be learning.
- One of his pet peeves in terms of questions that he gets is “I thought Al Gore invented the Internet.” For which he credits Gore for recognizing the importance of the Internet and writing legislation that helped enable the commercial use of the Internet which was called the “Information Super Highway.”
- When asked about Blockchain technology, he didn’t see the long term viability of cryptocurrency.
Dr. Cerf’s awards include US Presidential Medal of Freedom, US National Medal of Technology, the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering, the Prince of Asturias Award, the Tunisian National Medal of Science, the Japan Prize, the Charles Stark Draper award, the ACM Turing Award, Officer of the Legion d’Honneur and 29 honorary degrees. Currently, Dr. Cerf is Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist for Google.
The event was organized by the Sacramento ACM (Association of Computing Machinery) and hosted by the City of Sacramento with Mayor, Darrell Steinberg, giving the welcoming presentation.
This event highlights the region’s focus on technology and innovation. As Darrell Steinberg stated, “We are no longer satisfied with being just a government town.”
Thanks for the recap! Great to know what historic visionairies and achievers think about our current times and the future ahead. He did identify a huge risk with IoT. I am surprised at his low expectation for blockchain and cryptocurrency. It seems more than a logical fit for IoT. It will be essential to integrate IoT with our economy and provide that security he values too. But we all shall see.