Gary C. Kessler is an Associate Professor and program director of the Computer & Digital Forensics, Computer Networking, and Information Security majors at Champlain College in Burlington, Vermont, where he also directs the Champlain College Center for Digital Investigation. Gary's primary areas of professional interest include computer and network forensics, computer and network security, TCP/IP and the Internet, LAN and WAN technologies, and communications standards.
Prior to coming to Champlain College in June 2000, Gary was a Senior Network Security Analyst at SymQuest Group, a network integration consulting company in South Burlington, Vermont. In his previous life, he was the Director of Information Technology and a Senior Member of Technical Staff at Hill Associates, a telecommunications education and training firm located in Colchester, Vermont. He has been providing telecommunications course development, education, and consulting services since 1984, both at Hill Associates and as an independent consultant, with a brief hiatus as a Senior Consultant in the Professional Services Group at Bolt Beranek and Newman (BBN) Systems & Technologies (where he telecommuted to the group's Cambridge, Massachusetts office and was program manager of CommerceNet's Public Key Infrastructure Task Force).
Gary has been a software engineer at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, CA; Coordinator of Academic Computing at St. Michael's College in Colchester; and an applications programmer supporting researchers in the Cardiology Department at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. He has a B.A. in Math from Humboldt State University in Arcata, CA, an M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Vermont, and an Ed.S. in Computing Technology in Education (CTE) at Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Gary is currently in the CTE doctoral program at Nova.
Gary was instrumental in forwarding the advancement of computer crime legislation in Vermont, the last state in the U.S. to enact such legislation (1999). He continues to be active with efforts to promote use of digital signatures and electronic commerce both in the state as well as throughout the Internet community. Gary is also the founding chair of the Vermont InfraGard chapter, and technical adviser to the Vermont Internet Crimes Task Force.
Gary is the co-author (with Peter V. Southwick) of ISDN: Concepts, Facilities, and Services, 4th. edition (McGraw-Hill, 1998), the co-author (with David A. Train) of Metropolitan Area Networks: Concepts, Standards, and Services (McGraw-Hill, 1992), and has written over sixty articles for industry publications. Gary may even be seen at various industry conferences, such as Comdex, ComNet, HTCIA, IEEE Conference on Computer Networks, ICA/Supercomm, Internet Commerce Expo (ICe), and LatinNet, teaching tutorials or giving shorter presentations.
One of Gary's special interests is the history of computing, computers, and networking. He is a charter member of The Computer Museum and the Internet Society.
Gary can be reached at his college office at +1 802-865-6460, cell phone at +1 802-238-8913, or via e-mail at kumquat@sover.net. If you'd like, you are welcome to read his entire resume!!
On a more personal note, Gary lives in Burlington, Vermont — a new move after 27 years in Colchester — with his wife, Gayle. His son, Joshua, is the Assistant Sports Information Director at Wheaton College in Massachusetts. His daughter, Sarah, is a radiography technician at Fletcher Allen Health Care in Burlington and son-in-law, David, is a mechanic at Automaster in Shelburne; they live in South Burlington with Isabella Ann. Gary's step-daughter, Hilary, is in graduate school at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and his step-son, Daniel, is a junior at Champlain College. Gary is a life member (and former Chief) of the Colchester Rescue Squad and was an Emergency Medical Technician from 1979-2006; he is also a member of the Green Mountain Critical Incident Stress Debriefing (CISD) Team. Other interests include SCUBA diving, rock climbing, and playing the guitar (albeit stuck in a 1960s-70s folk music time warp, at least until Mary Chapin Carpenter, 10,000 Maniacs, and Dave Matthews Band came along).