The fourth conference, held in Orlando Florida, was, in terms of overall attendance, one of the more successful of the annual conferences. Consequently, the committee chose to return to Orlando for ACSAC 9. Our hotel was the Marriott, International Drive. This turned out to be an excellent choice as ACSAC 9 turned out to be our most successful conference in recent years with over 280 attending.

Committee for ACSAC 9

Conference Chairman: Ron Gove Program Chairman: Ann Marmor-Squires Vendor Track: Steve Rome Treasurer: Gary Smith Assistant Treasurer: Jandria Alexander Tutorials: Daniel Faigin Publicity: Diana Akers Publications: Victoria Ashby Recording Secretary: Noelle McAuliffe Registration: Marshall Abrams Video Tape Producer: Robin Medlock Student Papers: Ravi Sandhu ACSA Chairman of the Board: Marshall Abrams Member-at-Large: Dixie Baker Member-at-Large: Robert Kovach

In several early conferences the conference had had some limited vendor exhibits but this was not successful. For ACSAC 9, the planning committee suggested that we attempt once again to obtain vendor participation. The committee proposed that a track of un-refereed presentations by vendors focusing on technical applications of their products would be useful and informative. The general chairman, Ron Gove, asked Steve Rome of the Center for Information Systems Security, Defense Information Systems Agency, to plan and organize a track along these lines. The resulting vendor track, including vendor exhibits during the Wednesday evening reception, was a tremendous success and would become a permanent feature of the conference.

The keynote speaker was Robert Ayers, Director, Center for Information Systems Security, Defense Information Systems Agency. The distinguished lecturer was H. O. Lubbes who has been involved with computers and computer security during his 30 year career with the Federal Government. He was involved in writing the early Navy Instructions for ADP security. A small sample of the programs in which he had a key role include the Secure Communications Processor (SCOMP), the ACCAT Guard, and the CINCIBERLANT CCIS H. O. Provided a personal view of the growth of COMPUSEC over his long career in his talk: COMPUSEC, A Personal View.

The ACM SIGSAC continued their special workshops with a session on Compartmented Mode Workstations. The workshop was chaired by Harvey Rabinovitz and Rowena Chester and considered such issues as porting applications not designed for CMWs, secure system accreditation, application licensing, and networking.

The conference committee is always considering new ideas for making the conference interesting and informative to the participants. For ACSAC 9, Dr. Marshall Abrams introduced the Great Debate. Several outspoken and controversial advocates considered the two topics:

• The government's computer security initiatives have been costly but unproductive and should be abandoned
• Can anyone feel secure with a million lines of OS? Can security be compatible with modern operating systems that attempt to support "multiple personalities?"

View a complete listing of the sessions at the ninth conference.