Hacking The Bomb

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Hacking the Bomb

Author : Andrew Futter
Publisher : Georgetown University Press
ISBN 13 : 1626165661
Total Pages : 208 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (261 download)

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Book Synopsis Hacking the Bomb by : Andrew Futter

Download or read book Hacking the Bomb written by Andrew Futter and published by Georgetown University Press. This book was released on 2018-04-02 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Are nuclear arsenals safe from cyber-attack? Could terrorists launch a nuclear weapon through hacking? Are we standing at the edge of a major technological challenge to global nuclear order? These are among the many pressing security questions addressed in Andrew Futter’s ground-breaking study of the cyber threat to nuclear weapons. Hacking the Bomb provides the first ever comprehensive assessment of this worrying and little-understood strategic development, and it explains how myriad new cyber challenges will impact the way that the world thinks about and manages the ultimate weapon. The book cuts through the hype surrounding the cyber phenomenon and provides a framework through which to understand and proactively address the implications of the emerging cyber-nuclear nexus. It does this by tracing the cyber challenge right across the nuclear weapons enterprise, explains the important differences between types of cyber threats, and unpacks how cyber capabilities will impact strategic thinking, nuclear balances, deterrence thinking, and crisis management. The book makes the case for restraint in the cyber realm when it comes to nuclear weapons given the considerable risks of commingling weapons of mass disruption with weapons of mass destruction, and argues against establishing a dangerous norm of “hacking the bomb.” This timely book provides a starting point for an essential discussion about the challenges associated with the cyber-nuclear nexus, and will be of great interest to scholars and students of security studies as well as defense practitioners and policy makers.

Bomb (Graphic Novel)

Author : Steve Sheinkin
Publisher : Roaring Brook Press
ISBN 13 : 1250291038
Total Pages : 258 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (52 download)

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Book Synopsis Bomb (Graphic Novel) by : Steve Sheinkin

Download or read book Bomb (Graphic Novel) written by Steve Sheinkin and published by Roaring Brook Press. This book was released on 2023-01-24 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A riveting graphic novel adaptation of the award-winning nonfiction book, Bomb—the fascinating and frightening true story of the creation behind the most destructive force that birthed the arms race and the Cold War. In December of 1938, a chemist in a German laboratory made a shocking discovery: When placed next to radioactive material, a Uranium atom split in two. That simple discovery launched a scientific race that spanned three continents. In Great Britain and the United States, Soviet spies worked their way into the scientific community; in Norway, a commando force slipped behind enemy lines to attack German heavy-water manufacturing; and deep in the desert, one brilliant group of scientists was hidden away at a remote site at Los Alamos. This is the story of the plotting, the risk-taking, the deceit, and genius that created the world's most formidable weapon. This is the story of the atomic bomb. New York Times bestselling author Steve Sheinkin's award-winning nonfiction book is now available reimagined in the graphic novel format. Full color illustrations from Nick Bertozzi are detailed and enriched with the nonfiction expertise Nick brings to the story as a beloved artist, comic book writer, and commercial illustrator who has written a couple of his own historical graphic novels, including Shackleton and Lewis & Clark. Accessible, gripping, and educational, this new edition of Bomb is perfect for young readers and adults alike. Praise for Bomb (2012): “This superb and exciting work of nonfiction would be a fine tonic for any jaded adolescent who thinks history is 'boring.' It's also an excellent primer for adult readers who may have forgotten, or never learned, the remarkable story of how nuclear weaponry was first imagined, invented and deployed—and of how an international arms race began well before there was such a thing as an atomic bomb.” —The Wall Street Journal “This is edge-of-the seat material that will resonate with YAs who clamor for true spy stories, and it will undoubtedly engross a cross-market audience of adults who dozed through the World War II unit in high school.” —The Bulletin (starred review) Also by Steve Sheinkin: Fallout: Spies, Superbombs, and the Ultimate Cold War Showdown The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights Undefeated: Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Most Dangerous: Daniel Ellsberg and the Secret History of the Vietnam War Born to Fly: The First Women's Air Race Across America The Notorious Benedict Arnold: A True Story of Adventure, Heroism & Treachery Which Way to the Wild West?: Everything Your Schoolbooks Didn't Tell You About Westward Expansion King George: What Was His Problem?: Everything Your Schoolbooks Didn't Tell You About the American Revolution Two Miserable Presidents: Everything Your Schoolbooks Didn't Tell You About the Civil War

Cyber Threats and Nuclear Weapons

Author : Herbert Lin
Publisher : Stanford University Press
ISBN 13 : 1503630404
Total Pages : 206 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (36 download)

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Book Synopsis Cyber Threats and Nuclear Weapons by : Herbert Lin

Download or read book Cyber Threats and Nuclear Weapons written by Herbert Lin and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2021-10-19 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The technology controlling United States nuclear weapons predates the Internet. Updating the technology for the digital era is necessary, but it comes with the risk that anything digital can be hacked. Moreover, using new systems for both nuclear and non-nuclear operations will lead to levels of nuclear risk hardly imagined before. This book is the first to confront these risks comprehensively. With Cyber Threats and Nuclear Weapons, Herbert Lin provides a clear-eyed breakdown of the cyber risks to the U.S. nuclear enterprise. Featuring a series of scenarios that clarify the intersection of cyber and nuclear risk, this book guides readers through a little-understood element of the risk profile that government decision-makers should be anticipating. What might have happened if the Cuban Missile Crisis took place in the age of Twitter, with unvetted information swirling around? What if an adversary announced that malware had compromised nuclear systems, clouding the confidence of nuclear decision-makers? Cyber Threats and Nuclear Weapons, the first book to consider cyber risks across the entire nuclear enterprise, concludes with crucial advice on how government can manage the tensions between new nuclear capabilities and increasing cyber risk. This is an invaluable handbook for those ready to confront the unique challenges of cyber nuclear risk.

The Year of the Bomb

Author : Ronald Kidd
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1416958924
Total Pages : 210 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (169 download)

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Book Synopsis The Year of the Bomb by : Ronald Kidd

Download or read book The Year of the Bomb written by Ronald Kidd and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2009-06-09 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It's 1955, and Paul and his friends are excited when filming of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" begins in their small California town. But they soon become involved in a conspiracy that puts them in real danger.

The Hacked World Order

Author : Adam Segal
Publisher : PublicAffairs
ISBN 13 : 161039416X
Total Pages : 320 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (13 download)

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Book Synopsis The Hacked World Order by : Adam Segal

Download or read book The Hacked World Order written by Adam Segal and published by PublicAffairs. This book was released on 2016-02-23 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this updated edition of The Hacked World Order, cybersecurity expert Adam Segal offers unmatched insight into the new, opaque global conflict that is transforming geopolitics. For more than three hundred years, the world wrestled with conflicts between nation-states, which wielded military force, financial pressure, and diplomatic persuasion to create "world order." But in 2012, the involvement of the US and Israeli governments in Operation "Olympic Games," a mission aimed at disrupting the Iranian nuclear program through cyberattacks, was revealed; Russia and China conducted massive cyber-espionage operations; and the world split over the governance of the Internet. Cyberspace became a battlefield. Cyber warfare demands that the rules of engagement be completely reworked and all the old niceties of diplomacy be recast. Many of the critical resources of statecraft are now in the hands of the private sector, giant technology companies in particular. In this new world order, Segal reveals, power has been well and truly hacked.

Raid on the Sun

Author : Rodger Claire
Publisher : Crown
ISBN 13 : 0767918088
Total Pages : 308 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (679 download)

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Book Synopsis Raid on the Sun by : Rodger Claire

Download or read book Raid on the Sun written by Rodger Claire and published by Crown. This book was released on 2004-04-13 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first authorized inside account of one of the most daring—and successful—military operations in recent history From the earliest days of his dictatorship, Saddam Hussein had vowed to destroy Israel. So when France sold Iraq a top-of-the-line nuclear reactor in 1975, the Israelis were justifiably concerned—especially when they discovered that Iraqi scientists had already formulated a secret program to extract weapons-grade plutonium from the reactor, a first critical step in creating an atomic bomb. The reactor formed the heart of a huge nuclear plant situated twelve miles from Baghdad, 1,100 kilometers from Tel Aviv. By 1981, the reactor was on the verge of becoming “hot,” and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin knew he would have to confront its deadly potential. He turned to Israeli Air Force commander General David Ivry to secretly plan a daring surgical strike on the reactor—a never-before-contemplated mission that would prove to be one of the most remarkable military operations of all time. Written with the full and exclusive cooperation of the Israeli Air Force high command, General Ivry (ret.), and all of the eight mission pilots (including Ilan Ramon, who become Israel’s first astronaut and perished tragically in the shuttle Columbia disaster), Raid on the Sun tells the extraordinary story of how Israel plotted the unthinkable: defying its U.S. and European allies to eliminate Iraq’s nuclear threat. In the tradition of Black Hawk Down, journalist Rodger Claire re-creates a gripping tale of personal sacrifice and survival, of young pilots who trained in the United States on the then-new, radically sophisticated F-16 fighter bombers, then faced a nearly insurmountable challenge: how to fly the 1,000-plus-kilometer mission to Baghdad and back on one tank of fuel. He recounts Israeli intelligence’s incredible “black ops” to sabotage construction on the French reactor and eliminate Iraqi nuclear scientists, and he gives the reader a pilot’s-eye view of the action on June 7, 1981, when the planes roared off a runway on the Sinai Peninsula for the first successful destruction of a nuclear reactor in history.

Hacking the Atom

Author : Steven B. Krivit
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780996886451
Total Pages : 454 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (864 download)

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Book Synopsis Hacking the Atom by : Steven B. Krivit

Download or read book Hacking the Atom written by Steven B. Krivit and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 454 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written for scientists and non-scientists alike, this book provides an understanding of low-energy nuclear reaction (LENR) research and offers a rare look behind the scenes. The book sheds new light on physics and chemistry and reveals how changes to atomic nuclei can occur at low energies. For a century, this has been considered impossible.

Coding Freedom

Author : E. Gabriella Coleman
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691144613
Total Pages : 268 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (911 download)

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Book Synopsis Coding Freedom by : E. Gabriella Coleman

Download or read book Coding Freedom written by E. Gabriella Coleman and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Who are computer hackers? What is free software? And what does the emergence of a community dedicated to the production of free and open source software--and to hacking as a technical, aesthetic, and moral project--reveal about the values of contemporary liberalism? Exploring the rise and political significance of the free and open source software (F/OSS) movement in the United States and Europe, Coding Freedom details the ethics behind hackers' devotion to F/OSS, the social codes that guide its production, and the political struggles through which hackers question the scope and direction of copyright and patent law. In telling the story of the F/OSS movement, the book unfolds a broader narrative involving computing, the politics of access, and intellectual property. E. Gabriella Coleman tracks the ways in which hackers collaborate and examines passionate manifestos, hacker humor, free software project governance, and festive hacker conferences. Looking at the ways that hackers sustain their productive freedom, Coleman shows that these activists, driven by a commitment to their work, reformulate key ideals including free speech, transparency, and meritocracy, and refuse restrictive intellectual protections. Coleman demonstrates how hacking, so often marginalized or misunderstood, sheds light on the continuing relevance of liberalism in online collaboration.

Hack the Planet

Author : Eli Kintisch
Publisher : Turner Publishing Company
ISBN 13 : 047061871X
Total Pages : 269 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (76 download)

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Book Synopsis Hack the Planet by : Eli Kintisch

Download or read book Hack the Planet written by Eli Kintisch and published by Turner Publishing Company. This book was released on 2010-03-25 with total page 269 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An inside tour of the incredible—and probably dangerous—plans to counteract the effects of climate change through experiments that range from the plausible to the fantastic David Battisti had arrived in Cambridge expecting a bloodbath. So had many of the other scientists who had joined him for an invitation-only workshop on climate science in 2007, with geoengineering at the top of the agenda. We can't take deliberately altering the atmosphere seriously, he thought, because there’s no way we'll ever know enough to control it. But by the second day, with bad climate news piling on bad climate news, he was having second thoughts. When the scientists voted in a straw poll on whether to support geoengineering research, Battisti, filled with fear about the future, voted in favor. While the pernicious effects of global warming are clear, efforts to reduce the carbon emissions that cause it have fallen far short of what’s needed. Some scientists have started exploring more direct and radical ways to cool the planet, such as: Pouring reflective pollution into the upper atmosphere Making clouds brighter Growing enormous blooms of algae in the ocean Schemes that were science fiction just a few years ago have become earnest plans being studied by alarmed scientists, determined to avoid a climate catastrophe. In Hack the Planet, Science magazine reporter Eli Kintisch looks more closely at this array of ideas and characters, asking if these risky schemes will work, and just how geoengineering is changing the world. Scientists are developing geoengineering techniques for worst-case scenarios. But what would those desperate times look like? Kintisch outlines four circumstances: collapsing ice sheets, megadroughts, a catastrophic methane release, and slowing of the global ocean conveyor belt. As incredible and outlandish as many of these plans may seem, could they soon become our only hope for avoiding calamity? Or will the plans of brilliant and well-intentioned scientists cause unforeseeable disasters as they play out in the real world? And does the advent of geoengineering mean that humanity has failed in its role as steward of the planet—or taken on a new responsibility? Kintisch lays out the possibilities and dangers of geoengineering in a time of planetary tipping points. His investigation is required reading as the debate over global warming shifts to whether humanity should Hack the Planet.

Life Hacks for Kids

Author : Sunny Keller
Publisher : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN 13 : 132874213X
Total Pages : 211 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (287 download)

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Book Synopsis Life Hacks for Kids by : Sunny Keller

Download or read book Life Hacks for Kids written by Sunny Keller and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 2017 with total page 211 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents unique craft projects that have been seen on the Life hacks for kids YouTube show, including feather earrings, melted crayon art, a headband holder, and indoor s'mores, and includes questions answered by Sunny.

Hacking: The Next Generation

Author : Nitesh Dhanjani
Publisher : "O'Reilly Media, Inc."
ISBN 13 : 1449379214
Total Pages : 299 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (493 download)

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Book Synopsis Hacking: The Next Generation by : Nitesh Dhanjani

Download or read book Hacking: The Next Generation written by Nitesh Dhanjani and published by "O'Reilly Media, Inc.". This book was released on 2009-08-29 with total page 299 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With the advent of rich Internet applications, the explosion of social media, and the increased use of powerful cloud computing infrastructures, a new generation of attackers has added cunning new techniques to its arsenal. For anyone involved in defending an application or a network of systems, Hacking: The Next Generation is one of the few books to identify a variety of emerging attack vectors. You'll not only find valuable information on new hacks that attempt to exploit technical flaws, you'll also learn how attackers take advantage of individuals via social networking sites, and abuse vulnerabilities in wireless technologies and cloud infrastructures. Written by seasoned Internet security professionals, this book helps you understand the motives and psychology of hackers behind these attacks, enabling you to better prepare and defend against them. Learn how "inside out" techniques can poke holes into protected networks Understand the new wave of "blended threats" that take advantage of multiple application vulnerabilities to steal corporate data Recognize weaknesses in today's powerful cloud infrastructures and how they can be exploited Prevent attacks against the mobile workforce and their devices containing valuable data Be aware of attacks via social networking sites to obtain confidential information from executives and their assistants Get case studies that show how several layers of vulnerabilities can be used to compromise multinational corporations

The Unofficial Guide to Ethical Hacking

Author : Ankit Fadia
Publisher : Course Technology
ISBN 13 : 9781598630626
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (36 download)

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Book Synopsis The Unofficial Guide to Ethical Hacking by : Ankit Fadia

Download or read book The Unofficial Guide to Ethical Hacking written by Ankit Fadia and published by Course Technology. This book was released on 2006 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In an effort to create a secure computing platform, computer security has become increasingly important over the last several years. It is imperative to know the right tools and resources to use so that you can better protect your system from becoming the victim of attacks. Understanding the nature of things like file encryption, firewall, and viruses help you make your system more secure.

The Quantum Breach

Author : Denver Acey
Publisher : Cedar Fort Publishing & Media
ISBN 13 : 1462108989
Total Pages : 299 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (621 download)

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Book Synopsis The Quantum Breach by : Denver Acey

Download or read book The Quantum Breach written by Denver Acey and published by Cedar Fort Publishing & Media. This book was released on 2023-02-02 with total page 299 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Quantum computing is the atomic bomb of global information warfare. Its key is this man-made diamond, Larry said, "and we can't just steal it. So we need to hack into the network to get the diamond's code." Larry paused, letting Tanner process what he had been told. "That's why you're here." Tanner Zane is a Mormon with a secret criminal past. Nobody suspects that before his religious conversion he had hacked into thousands of computer networks across the globe. But Tanner's guarded past is exposed when he's kidnapped and forced to hack into an impossible target—Los Alamos National Labs. Inside is a prototype quantum computer powerful enough to crack the digital safeguards of the Internet. When Tanner learns that cyber-terrorists will use it for massive identify theft and corporate espionage around the world, he deliberately engages in an intellectual battle with his captors to prevent them from obtaining the device. The Quantum Breach makes you wonder just what you would be willing to sacrifice in order to save the world.

Breaking and Entering

Author : Jeremy N. Smith
Publisher : Eamon Dolan Books
ISBN 13 : 0544903218
Total Pages : 309 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (449 download)

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Book Synopsis Breaking and Entering by : Jeremy N. Smith

Download or read book Breaking and Entering written by Jeremy N. Smith and published by Eamon Dolan Books. This book was released on 2019-01-08 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This taut, true thriller dives into a dark world that touches us all, as seen through the brilliant, breakneck career of an extraordinary hacker--a woman known only as Alien. When she arrived at MIT in the 1990s, Alien was quickly drawn to the school's tradition of high‑risk physical trespassing: the original "hacking." Within a year, one of her hallmates was dead and two others were arraigned. Alien's adventures were only just beginning. After a stint at the storied, secretive Los Alamos National Laboratory, Alien was recruited by a top cybersecurity firm where she deployed her cache of virtual weapons--and the trespassing and social engineering talents she had developed while "hacking" at MIT. The company tested its clients' security by every means possible--not just coding, but donning disguises and sneaking past guards and secretaries into the C‑suite. Alien now runs a boutique hacking outfit that caters to some of the world's biggest and most vulnerable institutions--banks, retailers, government agencies. Her work combines devilish charm, old‑school deception, and next generation spycraft. In Breaking and Entering, cybersecurity finally gets the rich, character‑driven, fast-paced treatment it deserves.

Hacking Life

Author : Joseph M. Reagle, Jr.
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262538997
Total Pages : 217 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (625 download)

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Book Synopsis Hacking Life by : Joseph M. Reagle, Jr.

Download or read book Hacking Life written by Joseph M. Reagle, Jr. and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2020-02-18 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In an effort to keep up with a world of too much, life hackers sometimes risk going too far. Life hackers track and analyze the food they eat, the hours they sleep, the money they spend, and how they're feeling on any given day. They share tips on the most efficient ways to tie shoelaces and load the dishwasher; they employ a tomato-shaped kitchen timer as a time-management tool.They see everything as a system composed of parts that can be decomposed and recomposed, with algorithmic rules that can be understood, optimized, and subverted. In Hacking Life, Joseph Reagle examines these attempts to systematize living and finds that they are the latest in a long series of self-improvement methods. Life hacking, he writes, is self-help for the digital age's creative class. Reagle chronicles the history of life hacking, from Benjamin Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanack through Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and Timothy Ferriss's The 4-Hour Workweek. He describes personal outsourcing, polyphasic sleep, the quantified self movement, and hacks for pickup artists. Life hacks can be useful, useless, and sometimes harmful (for example, if you treat others as cogs in your machine). Life hacks have strengths and weaknesses, which are sometimes like two sides of a coin: being efficient is not the same thing as being effective; being precious about minimalism does not mean you are living life unfettered; and compulsively checking your vital signs is its own sort of illness. With Hacking Life, Reagle sheds light on a question even non-hackers ponder: what does it mean to live a good life in the new millennium?

Countdown to Zero Day

Author : Kim Zetter
Publisher : Crown
ISBN 13 : 0770436196
Total Pages : 450 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (74 download)

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Book Synopsis Countdown to Zero Day by : Kim Zetter

Download or read book Countdown to Zero Day written by Kim Zetter and published by Crown. This book was released on 2015-09-01 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A top cybersecurity journalist tells the story behind the virus that sabotaged Iran’s nuclear efforts and shows how its existence has ushered in a new age of warfare—one in which a digital attack can have the same destructive capability as a megaton bomb. “Immensely enjoyable . . . Zetter turns a complicated and technical cyber story into an engrossing whodunit.”—The Washington Post The virus now known as Stuxnet was unlike any other piece of malware built before: Rather than simply hijacking targeted computers or stealing information from them, it proved that a piece of code could escape the digital realm and wreak actual, physical destruction—in this case, on an Iranian nuclear facility. In these pages, journalist Kim Zetter tells the whole story behind the world’s first cyberweapon, covering its genesis in the corridors of the White House and its effects in Iran—and telling the spectacular, unlikely tale of the security geeks who managed to unravel a top secret sabotage campaign years in the making. But Countdown to Zero Day also ranges beyond Stuxnet itself, exploring the history of cyberwarfare and its future, showing us what might happen should our infrastructure be targeted by a Stuxnet-style attack, and ultimately, providing a portrait of a world at the edge of a new kind of war.

At the Abyss

Author : Thomas Reed
Publisher : Presidio Press
ISBN 13 : 0307414620
Total Pages : 386 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (74 download)

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Book Synopsis At the Abyss by : Thomas Reed

Download or read book At the Abyss written by Thomas Reed and published by Presidio Press. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “The Cold War . . . was a fight to the death,” notes Thomas C. Reed, “fought with bayonets, napalm, and high-tech weaponry of every sort—save one. It was not fought with nuclear weapons.” With global powers now engaged in cataclysmic encounters, there is no more important time for this essential, epic account of the past half century, the tense years when the world trembled At the Abyss. Written by an author who rose from military officer to administration insider, this is a vivid, unvarnished view of America’s fight against Communism, from the end of WWII to the closing of the Strategic Air Command, a work as full of human interest as history, rich characters as bloody conflict. Among the unforgettable figures who devised weaponry, dictated policy, or deviously spied and subverted: Whittaker Chambers—the translator whose book, Witness, started the hunt for bigger game: Communists in our government; Lavrenti Beria—the head of the Soviet nuclear weapons program who apparently killed Joseph Stalin; Col. Ed Hall—the leader of America’s advanced missile system, whose own brother was a Soviet spy; Adm. James Stockwell—the prisoner of war and eventual vice presidential candidate who kept his terrible secret from the Vietnamese for eight long years; Nancy Reagan—the “Queen of Hearts,” who was both loving wife and instigator of palace intrigue in her husband’s White House. From Eisenhower’s decision to beat the Russians at their own game, to the “Missile Gap” of the Kennedy Era, to Reagan’s vow to “lean on the Soviets until they go broke”—all the pivotal events of the period are portrayed in new and stunning detail with information only someone on the front lines and in backrooms could know. Yet At the Abyss is more than a riveting and comprehensive recounting. It is a cautionary tale for our time, a revelation of how, “those years . . . came to be known as the Cold War, not World War III.”