b. 1968, Pretoria, South Africa — Founder of OpenBSD; lead of the OpenSSH project
Also known as: de Raadt, Theo
Theo de Raadt founded OpenBSD in 1995 after being forced out of the NetBSD core team for personal-style reasons. OpenBSD's focus has been distinctive from the start: correctness-first, security- by-default, proactive code auditing, and an uncompromising stance on free-software licensing. "Only two remote holes in the default install, in a heck of a long time" was for years the project's tagline.
The project has produced a disproportionate share of software that runs on every other operating system, most notably OpenSSH — the ssh client and server that replaced telnet, rlogin, and rsh on nearly every Unix-like system, Linux included. Other OpenBSD exports include LibreSSL, OpenBGPD, OpenNTPD, and the pf packet filter.
De Raadt has strong opinions about software licensing, hardware documentation, and the FSF, all expressed with an abrasiveness that has made him controversial. Few dispute the security record.
Video
Related people: Linus Torvalds, Ken Thompson
Discussed in:
- Chapter 12: Networking — SSH and Remote Access
- Chapter 18: Security and Hardening — Security Foundations
