Donn B. Parker papers

The Donn B. Parker Papers consist of five main series: Donn B. Parker Talks and Writings, Professional Activities, Subject Files, SRI Computer Crime Case Files and Audio/Visual Materials.

In the course of Parker’s research, he and his SRI colleagues collected and categorized the largest amount of reported computer crime material in the world, created the most complete list of information abuse methods, and used it as the subject of research, reports, and other writings. The bulk of the collection contains SRI computer abuse and crime case files from 1958-2001 and materials in the process of investigation for becoming case files, including newspaper clippings and articles, field investigations, interviews and reports, and indexes to and listings of SRI case files.

The remainder of the collection consists of a portion of Parker’s talks and writings, professional activities and subject files. Talks and writings include articles, reports, and monographs. Parker’s professional activities are documented in project reports and other materials. Subject files are an artificially created series of miscellaneous materials collected by Parker outside the scope of his professional activities and writings. The materials include a large collection of computer security articles on various topics, biographical information, humor files and general SRI materials and reports.

The SRI Computer Crime Case Files series documents both numbered case files and materials in the process of gathering for potential case files (with the absence of an actual case file number). The latter were found in varying stages including loose clippings, clippings, articles, and reports grouped by state, country, or type of crime, and other various categories of computer crimes and issues.

Numbered SRI case files are identified by a five-digit number. The first two digits indicate the year of the incident, the next digit (between 1-4) indicates the type of computer crime committed, and the last two digits represent a sequence number for incidents of a particular type, which occurred within a given year.

There are four main case types indicated by numbers one through four. One (1) indicates Physical Destruction which includes facility, service, hardware, and software damage, and data destruction. Two (2) indicates Intellectual and Property Deception and Taking, including fraud and theft of rights, information, inventory and software. Three (3) denotes Financial Deception and Taking, such as embezzlement and fraud, and Four (4) identifies cases involving Unauthorized Use of Service which includes unauthorized use sale of service, unauthorized use of data, unfair and deceptive practices, and hacking and cracking.

Example: 75105 indicates the fifth occurrence of a computer crime case involving physical destruction (type 1) in 1975. The next occurrence of that type in 1975 would have an SRI case file number of 75106. Researchers should note that some early case files were written with four digits instead of five, using one digit to indicate the sequence of occurrence number instead of two for a particular year. Most, but not all of these numbers were later altered.

Materials used in the process of creating potential case files are either unorganized and/or unverified (loose clippings), or are organized in varying degrees. Though there is a clear distinction between numbered case files and other case file materials, the Materials Filed by Type of Crime subseries retains only a part of the same number system as the five-digit numbered SRI case files. This particular subseries contains the year and the type of computer crime, but not the last two digits indicating the sequence of occurrences for that particular year, therefore, these incidents did not advance into the system as an official SRI case file.

In addition to the numbered case files and materials, this series contains other computer security crime articles and reports which used Parker, his colleagues, and SRI computer crime data as sources. Researchers should note that grant reports contain a great deal of useful overview information about SRI International’s case file gathering process and computer crime assessments. Grant reports contain grant number and SRI project number. The number after the grant number indicates a sub-project within a NSF grant.

Acronyms used in this finding aid: