Michael Lawrie
Michael Lawrie is now the Technical Manager of Eastnet.ca and Trolltamers - Here's a brief history.
The Early Days
Michael is considered to be one of the earliest pioneers of European Internet and global Social Internetworking. He started using and moderating online-systems in 1982 and wrote his first online Multi User Game in 1984, having to write a networking infrastructure to support it. He moved onto manage the first ever MUD [1] at Essex University from 1987 to 1991, creating other major multi-user games such as MIST [2] in that time; and is credited with creating the extended endgame and adding in more social aspects to gameplay. He was the first person to release MUDs that people could host and run themselves in 1989 [3] and was key in bringing the Internet Relay Chat out of Finland to the Internet as a whole.
Throughout the eighties he was involved with public access network systems in the UK, including the Edinburgh University Tardis project [4] and HICOM. In 1991 he started offering free public access Internet to anybody who could think of a good reason via HICOM. His current Internet consultancy has been active since 1992 and Eastnet is a Canadian offshoot of that.
Security
Michael went on to become head of Commercial Security at British Telecom dealing with a range of customers and sectors including Government, Police, Education, the NHS, Banking, Insurance, Telecoms, Retail & Manufacture and also some of the smaller to medium enterprise customers. He was one of the first to build and manage BT’s backbone, commercial and home Internet and their mobile Internet services. Before working for BT, Michael had already spent over ten years in computer, financial and network security, in large scale risk-assessment and also in computer-misuse investigations and forensics; working on some large scale worldwide hacking cases and pioneering a number of network forensics techniques. As an early executive member of the Professional Bodyguard Association, he is also a specialist in threat-assessment, counter-surveillance and some of the more esoteric aspects of real-world security.
Recruitment.com and beyond
Michael left BT to create Recruitment.com, at the time one of the first online recruitment companies. As CTO of the company he was integral to building the company to company worth in excess of fifty million dollars with a large high street presence before he left and retired. After that he spent some time training in and writing about Risk-Analysis, Commercial Security, Policy and IT Law at Middlesex University in London; conducting risk surveys, and reviewing security policies and systems designs. He also occasionally wrote about and taught things that aren’t security related at all. He is also slowly rewriting a book that he wrote under NDA a few years ago and is working on another book about castles - Both are expected to be finished in about 2099.
Michael has also been involved in some high profile battles with large companies over trademark law, including a two year case against British Airports Authority over an internet site for sheep.
More Information
Here are some external links:
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