David Jack Farber | |
|---|---|
 Farber in 2008 | |
| Born | (1934-04-17)April 17, 1934 Jersey City, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Died | February 7, 2026(2026-02-07) (aged 91) Tokyo, Japan |
| Alma mater | Stevens Institute of Technology |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Computer science |
| Institutions | |
| Doctoral students | Jon Postel,Dave Sincoskie,Marshall Rose,Paul Mockapetris |
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David Jack Farber (April 17, 1934 – February 7, 2026) was an American professor ofcomputer science, noted for his major contributions toprogramming languages andcomputer networking and was a distinguished professor and co-director of Cyber Civilization Research Center[1] atKeio University in Japan.
Born in Jersey City, New Jersey on April 17, 1934,[2][3] Farber graduated from theStevens Institute of Technology with a B.E. degree in electrical engineering in 1956 and a M.S. degree in mathematics in 1961.[4] He then began an 11-year career atBell Laboratories, where he helped design the first electronic switching system (ESS-1) and theSNOBOL programming languages. He subsequently held industry positions at theRand Corporation andScientific Data Systems, followed by academic positions at theUniversity of California, Irvine, theUniversity of Delaware, andCarnegie Mellon University. He was awarded an honorary doctorate in engineering from the Stevens Institute in 1999.[4]
At Irvine his research work was focused on creating the world's first operational distributed computer system. While a member of the electrical engineering department of theUniversity of Delaware, he helped conceive and organize the major American research networksCSNET,NSFNet, and theNational Research and Education Network (NREN). He helped create the NSF/DARPA-funded Gigabit Network Test bed Initiative and served as the Chairman of the Gigabit Test bed Coordinating Committee.
Farber subsequently was appointed Alfred Fitler Moore Professor of Telecommunication Systems at theUniversity of Pennsylvania, where he also held appointments as professor of business and public policy at theWharton School of Business, and as a faculty associate of theAnnenberg School for Communication. Farber served as chief technologist at the USFederal Communications Commission (2000–2001) while on leave from the university.[5] In 2018, he moved to Japan to become Distinguished Professor atKeio University and Co-Director of the Keio Cyber Civilization Research Center (CCRC).[6]
He was a founding editor of ICANNWatch.[7] He served on the board of advisers of Context Relevant[8] and The Liquid Information Company.[9] He was one of the founding board members of theInternet Systems Consortium, and had served on that board since 1994.[10]
Farber died in Tokyo from heart failure on February 7, 2026, at the age of 91.[11][12][13]
Farber was anAAAS Fellow,IEEE Fellow,ACM Fellow, and recipient of the 1995SIGCOMM Award for lifelong contributions to computer communications. He served on the board of directors of theElectronic Frontier Foundation, theElectronic Privacy Information Center advisory board, the board of trustees of theInternet Society, and was a member of the Presidential Advisory Committee on High Performance Computing and Communications, Information Technology and Next Generation Internet. He ran a large (25,000+ readership)[14] mailing list called Interesting-People. In 2012, in memory of his son, he established the Joseph M. Farber prize at the Stevens Institute of Technology[15], which recognizes a graduating senior majoring in one of the disciplines of the College of Arts and Letters who displays a keen interest in and concern for civil liberties and their importance in preserving and protecting human rights.
On August 3, 2013, Farber was inducted into the Pioneers Circle of theInternet Hall of Fame.[16] He was elected as the AAAS Fellow by the Council of theAmerican Association for the Advancement of Science in 2018.
