Cornell Suspends Computer Student

Cornell Suspends Computer Student

By John Markoff
The New York Times

May 25, 1989

Cornell University has suspended Robert Tappan Morris, the 23-year-old graduate student identified by school officials as the author of a software program that jammed a nationwide computer network last November.

In a letter to Mr. Morris dated May 16, the dean of the Cornell University Graduate School said the university's Academic Integrity Hearing Board had found him guilty of violating the school's Code of Academic Integrity. The board recommended that he be suspended from Cornell until the beginning of the fall semester of 1990, and the dean, Alison P. Casarett, said she agreed with the recommendation.

The dean told Mr. Morris that if he wants to reapply, the decision on readmission would be made by the graduate school's computer science faculty. Mr. Morris was in the first year of the graduate program.

An 'Academic Decision'

In a telephone interview, Ms. Casarett said the decision to suspend Mr. Morris was made independently of any possible criminal penalty he might face. ''It was academic decision,'' she said. ''It's a confidential decision. Our process was entirely separate from anything legal authorities might have done.''

No criminal charges have been filed against Mr. Morris. A Federal grand jury met earlier this year to consider the case and forwarded its recommendations to the Justice Department, but the department has not taken any action.

Thomas A. Guidoboni, Mr. Morris's lawyer, said he was aware of the letter from Ms. Casarett but would have no comment. Mr. Morris is now living with his family in Maryland.

The letter indicated that Mr. Morris met with the academic board on April 17.

'A Juvenile Act'

In April a Cornell University commission reported that Mr. Morris had created the program that produced havoc in nationwide computer networks last November. The commission called the work ''a juvenile act that ignored the clear potential consequences.'' In reviewing the ethical issues raised by the program, the commission said, ''It may have been the unfocused intellectual meanderings of a hacker completely absorbed with his creation.''

The program released last November rapidly copied itself into computers connected to each other through networks, known as the Internet. The program infected as many as 6,000 computers at universities, private corporations and military installations.

The program was apparently intended to copy itself secretly but went awry due to a programming error. Although it did not destroy data, it forced a large number of computers to shut down. System managers had to spend several days clearing the program from their computers.