Letter from the Immediate Past TCSP Chair

Please join me in welcoming our new TCSP senior officers. Chuck Pfleeger, previous TCSP Vice-Chair, is our new TCSP Chair. Working with Chuck these past two years, I have witnessed his commitment to the best interests of our TCSP. Our newly elected TCSP Vice-Chair and incumbent Chair is Tom Berson. Tom has been a wellspring of innovative and adroit solutions for the challenges faced by the TCSP and Oakland conference organizers for over two decades. The TCSP will certainly benefit from the leadership of Chuck Pfleeger and Tom Berson.

I would like to thank the members of the TCSP Executive Committee: Senior Advisor, Terry Benzel; Academic Affairs Chair, Karl Levitt; Standards Chair, Greg Bergren; Conference Chair, Steve Kent; and Cipher Editor, Carl Landwehr. Carl and his Cipher volunteers continue to produce a technical newsletter of unparalleled quality. Steve Kent, Mike Reiter, George Dinolt, Paul Karger and Charles Payne are to be commended for a highly successful 1997 Symposium on Security and Privacy. Greg Bergren was our lifeline to a multitude of security standards activities, and kept us always informed. Our first Academic Affairs chair, Karl Levitt, had the formidable task of organizing an agenda and establishing liaisons with academia, and we appreciate his efforts. As immediate past TCSP chair, I succeed Terry Benzel as senior advisor. Terry has made my job easier,and we have all benefited from her shared insights and contributions.

As a volunteer member, I will continue to focus on ways for the Computer Society to improve its member services and working relationships with the TCSP and other technical committees. Surprisingly enough, I am a nominee for the Computer Society Board of Governors. I view this as an opportunity to take our TCSP experiences strategies up one level in the Computer Society.

The TCSP continues to be one of the most successful and dynamic Technical Committees of the IEEE Computer Society, due to the contributions of its members. I extend my sincere gratitude to all our TCSP members and dedicated volunteers for the achievements of the past two years. I look forward to a great future for our TCSP under the leadership of Chuck and Tom and our new Executive Committee officers.

Thanks again to all of you for your support!

Deborah M. Cooper
Immediate Past Chair, Technical Committee on Security and Privacy