Influential women in the technology industry: Radia Perlman
Nashville, Tenn. (March 18, 2025) - To celebrate Women’s History Month, Connected Nation is profiling influential women in today’s technology industry. One is Radia Perlman. Perlman was one of the only women in the 1970s working on assembling networks to enable what we now know as the internet.
Perlman is an American computer programmer and network engineer. Her contributions have significantly influenced the way networks self-organize and transfer data. Her innovations have made modern link-state routing protocols more robust, scalable, and manageable. Perlman's work even earned her the name “Mother of the Internet”.
Long before Perlman was an influential woman in technology, she was a curious young girl who grew up in New Jersey. With an interest in software and digital engineering, she decided to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). This is where she earned her B.S. and M.S. degrees, both in Mathematics.
Right after graduation, Perlman accepted a position with Bolt, Beranek, and Newman (BBN), a government contractor that develops software for network equipment. After a few great years at BBN, Perlman joined the Digital Equipment Organization (DEC) in 1980. This is where she would have one of the biggest impacts on technology in her career.
In 1984, Perlman produced a long-awaited networking solution that DEC was striving for. This solution was called the Spanning Tree Protocol (STP). STP is a network protocol that builds a loop-free logical topology for Ethernet networks. Basically, STP works like a network traffic cop. It prevents data from getting stuck in endless loops by figuring out the best path to send information through a network. The creation of this algorithm is what made her known as the “Mother of the Internet”.
This was a big move in the creation of the internet. After her time at DEC, Perlman wanted to use her talents to help other organizations. In 1993 she started at Novell, and then, in 1997, she took her next position at Sun Microsystems.
Along with the creation of STP, Perlman holds 200 other U.S. patents. But her accomplishments go far beyond just that. She taught many courses at Harvard University, the University of Washington, and MIT. She’s also an author. Her first book, Interconnections: Bridges, Routers, Switches, and Internetworking Protocols, was published in 2015. Her second book, Network Security: Private Communication in a Public World, was published in 2022 and is now used as a popular college textbook.
Other awards and accolades include:
- 2004 Silicon Valley Intellectual Property Law Association Inventor of the year
- Twice named as one of the 20 most influential people in information technology by Data Communication Magazine in the 20th and 25th addition
- 2014 Internet Hall of Fame Inductee
Perlman is a great example to young girls that there is a place in the technology industry for women. While her name may not be as well-known as some other male tech giants, her contributions have been crucial in making the Internet reliable and secure.
Past Connected Nation Women’s History Month articles:
- Tech’s gender gap: Exploring women’s forgotten contributions
- How a national nonprofit is demonstrating ways to #BreakTechBias in technology
- Influential women in the tech industry: Susan Wojcicki
- It’s time for even more women to take on tech
- Pushing through barriers: What value women bring to the job market
About the Author: Lily McCoy is the Connected Nation Senior Communications Specialist. Lily provides support to the Communications Department through social media outreach and writing. She also adds creativity to the team with a background in personal relations and marketing. Lily has a bachelor’s in corporate and organizational communications from Western Kentucky University.