Malicious Life Podcast: Fred Cohen, The Godfather of Computer Viruses [ML B-Side]

In his 1984 seminal paper - Computer Viruses: Theory and Experiments - Dr. Fred Cohen not only introduced the name ‘computer virus’, a term invented by his mentor, Leonard Adelman, but was also the first to analyze computer viruses in a rigorous mathematical way, proving that computer viruses were not only practical - but that they were in fact inevitable. Nate Nelson, our Sr. producer, spoke with Dr. Cohen about his early research into computer viruses, his work with the US army, the panicky response from the US government - and the parallels between computer viruses and mental viruses - i.e. memes.

Malicious Life Podcast
About the Author

Malicious Life Podcast

The Malicious Life Podcast by Cybereason examines the human and technical factors behind the scenes that make cybercrime what it is today. Malicious Life explores the people and the stories behind the cybersecurity industry and its evolution, with host Ran Levi interviewing hackers and other security industry experts about hacking culture and the cyber attacks that define today’s threat landscape. The show has a monthly audience of over 200,000 and growing.

All Posts by Malicious Life Podcast
ran-levi-headshot
About the Host

Ran Levi

Born in Israel in 1975, Malicious Life Podcast host Ran studied Electrical Engineering at the Technion Institute of Technology, and worked as an electronics engineer and programmer for several High Tech companies in Israel.

In 2007, created the popular Israeli podcast Making History. He is author of three books (all in Hebrew): Perpetuum Mobile: About the history of Perpetual Motion Machines; The Little University of Science: A book about all of Science (well, the important bits, anyway) in bite-sized chunks; Battle of Minds: About the history of computer malware.

About The Malicious Life Podcast

Malicious Life by Cybereason exposes the human and financial powers operating under the surface that make cybercrime what it is today. Malicious Life explores the people and the stories behind the cybersecurity industry and its evolution. Host Ran Levi interviews hackers and industry experts, discussing the hacking culture of the 1970s and 80s, the subsequent rise of viruses in the 1990s and today’s advanced cyber threats.

Malicious Life theme music: ‘Circuits’ by TKMusic, licensed under Creative Commons License. Malicious Life podcast is sponsored and produced by Cybereason. Subscribe and listen on your favorite platform:

All Posts by Malicious Life Podcast