You take off your shoes in the airport. You scan the supermarket's "preferred customer" card to get the sale price. You claw your way through tamper-resistant packaging for a couple of aspirin. You accept all these inconveniences in the name of security.

But are you any safer?

Bruce Schneier, arguably the world's foremost authority on computer security, has explored security issues ranging from protecting your password to illegal wiretapping. This collection of Schneier's best op-ed pieces, columns, and blog posts goes beyond technology, offering his insight into everything from the risk of identity theft (vastly overrated) to the long-range security threat of unchecked presidential power and the surprisingly simple way to tamper-proof elections. You'll discover:

• Why data mining will never protect us from terrorists

• How your stone-age brain affects what you fear and what security measures you accept

• Why computer security is fundamentally an economic problem

• Whether you can really trust a Trusted Traveler

• If sacrificing your privacy has made you more secure

• Why refusing driver's licenses to illegal immigrants actually reduces security

• The industry power struggle over controlling your computer

• Why we overestimate some risks and underestimate others

• Why national ID cards won't make us safer, only poorer

• . . . and much more

This book will challenge your illusions of security at every level. Think it's okay to give up your privacy if you're doing nothing wrong? What happens when "wrong" gets redefined? How much power over your personal life are you willing to concede to the person you least want to see as president? What's the acceptable trade-off between security and convenience?

In this ruthless, comprehensive, and thought-provoking analysis, Schneier shows us what we should be worrying about and how to get our national fingers off the panic button.

"Schneier on Security" covers every aspect of computer security, including privacy, economics, national security, and terrorism.

Presenting invaluable advice from the worlds most famous computer security expert, this intensely readable collection features some of the most insightful and informative coverage of the strengths and weaknesses of computer security and the price people pay — figuratively and literally — when security fails. Discussing the issues surrounding things such as airplanes, passports, voting machines, ID cards, cameras, passwords, Internet banking, sporting events, computers, and castles, this book is a must-read for anyone who values security at any level — business, technical, or personal.

"One of the world's foremost security experts."

— Wired

"A security guru."

— The Economist

"Security sage and notorious cynic."

— CNET

Are you really safer than before 9/11?

We've sacrificed our privacy, convenience, and sometimes even our dignity to feel safer. But has it bought us security, or merely an illusion?

Bruce Schneier, world-renowned security technologist, recognizes that the ultimate security risk is people. In this compendium of articles and blog postings, the bestselling author of Secrets and Lies explains why many security practices are in fact security risks, and how we can truly become safer — not only online, but also on airplanes, at work, at school, and in our daily lives. In a world grown increasingly paranoid, Schneier makes a compelling case for common sense.

Bruce Schneier has been called the security industry's equivalent of a rock star. An internationally renowned security technologist, he is best known as a refreshingly candid and lucid security critic and commentator. The bestselling author of eight books, including Applied Cryptography and Secrets and Lies, both published by Wiley, and Beyond Fear, published by Springer-Verlag, he has written articles and commentary that have appeared in numerous prominent publications and has testified before Congress on security issues. Schneier maintains the extremely popular "Schneier on Security" blog (www.schneier.com/blog).