ISC recognizes Fred Baker's years of service to the Internet

Fred Baker, ISC Board Member from 1994 - 2025

Yesterday ISC, and the Internet as a whole, lost a generous long-time contributor.

Frederick J. Baker (February 28, 1952 - June 18, 2025) was one of the original members of the ISC Board of Directors, appointed at ISC’s incorporation in 1994.

Fred had a long career in the communications industry, working for Control Data Corporation, Vitalink Communications, Advanced Computer Communications, and for 22 years, at Cisco Systems.

After retiring from Cisco, Fred worked as a contractor, notably for the Internet Society and ISC. In addition to serving on the ISC BOD, in 2017 he joined the Root Server System Advisory Committee of ICANN, representing ISC. He served as Co-Chair of RSSAC from October 2018 to December 2019, and as Chair from January 2020 through December 2022.

Fred volunteered a lot of his time to working with the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), the body that develops standards for the Internet. He chaired a number of IETF working groups, including several that specified the management information bases (MIB) used to manage network bridges and popular telecommunications links, and the IPv6 Operations working group. He served as IETF chair from 1996 to 2001, and he served on the Internet Architecture Board from 1996 through 2002. Fred co-authored or edited at least 60 Request for Comments (RFC) documents on Internet protocols, and contributed to others. The subjects covered include network management, Open Shortest Path First (OSPF) and Routing Information Protocol (RIPv2) routing, quality of service (using both the Integrated Services and Differentiated Services models), Lawful Interception, precedence-based services on the Internet, and others.

In addition, he served as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Internet Society from 2002 through 2008, and as its chair from 2002 through 2006. He was a member of the Technical Advisory Council of the US Federal Communications Commission in 2004. He worked as a liaison to other standards organizations such as the ITU-T. In 2009-2010, he served as chair of the RFC Series Oversight Committee.

He represented IETF on the National Institute of Standards and Technology Smart Grid Interoperability Panel and Architecture Committee from 2008-2013, and was Cisco’s representative to a Broadband Internet Technical Advisory Group. He also holds several patents.

Fred was committed to the collaborative, consensus-driven process of creating open standards for the Internet and he demonstrated his commitment throughout his long career with years of active volunteering. Besides his leadership roles, he also welcomed and mentored new participants in the IETF.

Fred was a wonderful guy, an Internet luminary, and a great friend to ISC over the course of decades of board membership, as well as representing ISC at RSSAC as chair and in many other roles in the IETF, ICANN, and ISOC worlds. Fred will be dearly missed.

We extend our deepest condolences to Fred’s family.