A note on the confinement problem

The work

AuthorsButler Lampson
Typearticle
Year1973
Citekeylampson1973note

Where it appeared

Published inCommunications of the ACM
PublisherAssociation for Computing Machinery
Volume16
Issue10
Pages613--615

Identifiers

DOI10.1145/362375.362389
OpenAlexW2099137371

Abstract

This note explores the problem of confining a program during its execution so that it cannot transmit information to any other program except its caller. A set of examples attempts to stake out the boundaries of the problem. Necessary conditions for a solution are stated and informally justified.

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Added2026-08-04 00:00 UTC
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Cite it as

@article{lampson1973note,
  title        = {A note on the confinement problem},
  author       = {Butler Lampson},
  year         = {1973},
  journal      = {Communications of the ACM},
  volume       = {16},
  number       = {10},
  pages        = {613--615},
  publisher    = {Association for Computing Machinery},
  doi          = {10.1145/362375.362389},
}

This record lives at https://refs.drheap.org/lampson1973note/ and will keep doing so.