The hard part was that everything was new at the same time. There was new hardware. There were new protocols. There was a new implementation of protocols in the operating system. It was actually difficult to figure out how to build protocol software in the operating systems. We had new applications. Things that…you have to understand at the time people didn’t use networks. So everything was being done at the same time.
Douglas Comer
My final thanks for intimidating me into studying protocols goes to those obnoxious and absolutely incompetent NSF reviewers who forced me to study.
It’s always true that it’s easier to break things than to make them secure. So, as long as we have just an arms race, the bad guys will keep winning.