Synopses & Reviews
From the author who made "hackers" a household word, a groundbreaking book about the most hotly debated subject of the digital age.
Crypto is about privacy in the information age and about the nerds and visionaries who, nearly twenty years ago, predicted that the Internet's greatest virtue free access to information was also its most perilous drawback: a possible end to privacy.
Levy explores what turned out to be a decisive development in the crypto wars: the unlikely alliance between the computer geeks and big business as they fought the government's stranglehold on the keys to information in a networked world.
The players come alive here in a narrative that reads like the best of futuristic spy fiction. There is Whit Diffie, the long-haired Newton of crypto who invented the astounding "public key" solution; David Chaum, whose "anonymous digital money" actually threatened the global financial infrastructure; and "cypherpunks" like Phil Zimmermann, who freely distributed military-strength codes under the nose of the U. S. government. There is also the first behind-the-scenes account of what the secretive National Security Agency really had in mind when it created the controversial "clipper chip" and how the Clinton administration bungled the operation.
Cryptography the use of secret codes has traditionally been the province of puzzle geeks and government spies. But just in time for the Internet, which radically alters the way we share information, a band of outsiders triggered a revolution in this once-cloistered field. But this was a revolution that the government wanted to kill....
Review
"Civilian crypto hardly existed three decades ago. Now we can't get cash from an ATM or buy something on the Net without it. To tell the story coherently is a service, and to tell it entertainingly is a favor to anyone with a stake in crypto which nowadays means all of us. Crypto is a book that needed to be written and Steven Levy has written it."
Neal Stephenson, author of Cryptonomicon
Review
"Gripping and illuminating."
The Wall Street Journal "A great David-and-Goliath storyhumble hackers hoodwink sinister spooks." Time
Synopsis
If you've ever made a secure purchase with your credit card over the Internet, then you have seen cryptography, or "crypto", in action. From Stephen Levythe author who made "hackers" a household wordcomes this account of a revolution that is already affecting every citizen in the twenty-first century. Crypto tells the inside story of how a group of "crypto rebels"nerds and visionaries turned freedom fightersteamed up with corporate interests to beat Big Brother and ensure our privacy on the Internet. Levy's history of one of the most controversial and important topics of the digital age reads like the best futuristic fiction.
About the Author
Steven Levy is the author of Hackers, which has been in print for more than fifteen years, as well as Insanely Great: The Life and Times of Macintosh, the Computer That Changed Everything. He is also Newsweek's chief technology writer and has been a contributing writer to Wired since its inception. He lives in New York City with his wife and son.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Preface
The Loner
The Standard
Public Key
Prime Time
Selling Crypto
Patents and Keys
Crypto Anarchy
The Clipper Chip
Slouching Toward Crypto
Epilogue: The Open Secret
Notes
Bibliography
Glossary
Index