Synopses & Reviews
James Bamford exposed the existence of the top-secret National Security Agency in the bestselling
The Puzzle Palace and continued to probe into its workings in his follow-up bestseller,
Body of Secrets. Now Bamford discloses inside, often shocking information about the transformation of the NSA in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of 2001.
In THE SHADOW FACTORY, Bamford shows how the NSAs failure to detect the presence of two of the 9/11 hijackers inside the United States led the NSA to abandon its long-held policy of spying only on enemies outside the country. Instead, after 9/11 it turned its almost limitless ability to listen in on friend and foe alike over to the Bush Administration to use as a weapon in the war on terror. With unrivaled access to sources and documents, Bamford details how the agency has conducted domestic surveillance without court approval, and he frames it in the context of the NSAs ongoing hunt for information about todays elusive enemies.
THE SHADOW FACTORY is a riveting read for anyone concerned about civil liberties and Americas security in the post-9/11 world.
Review
Washington Post "Chilling . . . Extraordinary and urgent."
Christian Science Monitor
"Unsettling . . . Deeply informative."
James Risen, author of Pay Any Price: Greed, Power, and Endless War
“@War is a remarkable achievement. Harris uses dogged shoe-leather reporting to take us deep inside the government’s surveillance and cyber operations to give an unsparing look at what the NSA and other agencies are really doing with all our data. In the age of abstract Snowden documents, @War actually introduces us to the people running America’s electronic spying machine, and offers invaluable insights into how their ambition and turf battles impact our financial security, our privacy, and our freedom.”
Thomas E. Ricks, author of Fiasco and The Generals
“A great overview of our new cyberfronts. Unlike most books about cyberwar, this one is enjoyably readable. At times it feels like a modern spy novel, but it is a guide to tomorrow’s headlines.”
Peter Bergen, author of Manhunt: The Ten-Year Search for Bin Laden from 9/11 to Abbottabad
“@War is a tour de force of reporting on the past, present, and future of cyber-conflict. It will be required reading both in the Pentagon and among the army of Chinese cyber spies now assaulting American businesses. Hackers, policy makers, and others will find this book both intriguing and alarming; not to mention very well written.”
Publishers Weekly
"Cyber-espionage is the 'single most productive means of gathering information about our country’s adversaries,' writes Harris (The Watchers: The Rise of America’s Surveillance State), senior writer for Foreign Policy, in this unnerving exposé. After 9/11, the National Security Administration (NSA), the nation’s global information-gathering agency, submitted a wish list to the Bush administration. It was approved and the “'military-Internet complex was born.' According to Harris, electronic eavesdropping was fundamental to 2007’s Iraq surge and the NSA located Osama bin Laden through spyware planted in his operatives’ mobile phones. Readers will squirm as they learn how every communications enterprise (Google, AT&T, Verizon, Facebook) cooperates with the national security establishment. Harris delivers a convincing account of the terrible cyberdisasters that loom, and the intrusive nature of the fight to prevent them."
Kirkus Reviews
"Sprawling account of how the U.S. military joined forces with the National Security Agency to develop 'cyber warfare' capabilities, monitoring America's enemies and its citizens alike. Harris adeptly documents the online threats directed at American society, ranging from the Chinese military's well-funded hacking cells to large-scale information thefts committed by international crime syndicates, but he also demonstrates the NSA's insatiable collection of metadata and preparation of "backdoor" cyberweapons for future use, concluding that '[a]nonymity and collective security may be incompatible in cyberspace.'"
Synopsis
Bamford exposes the existence of the top-secret National security Agency in the bestselling "The Puzzle Palace," and in his follow-up bestseller "Body of Secrets." Now the author discloses inside, often shocking information about the NSA in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.
Synopsis
An investigation into how the Pentagon, NSA, and other government agencies are uniting with corporations to fight in cyberspace, the next great theater of war.
Synopsis
A surprising, page-turning account of how the wars of the future are already being fought todayThe United States military currently views cyberspace as the “fifth domain” of warfare (alongside land, air, sea, and space), and the Department of Defense, the National Security Agency, and the CIA all field teams of hackers who can, and do, launch computer virus strikes against enemy targets. In fact, as @WAR shows, U.S. hackers were crucial to our victory in Iraq. Shane Harris delves into the frontlines of America’s new cyber war. As recent revelations have shown, government agencies are joining with tech giants like Google and Facebook to collect vast amounts of information. The military has also formed a new alliance with tech and finance companies to patrol cyberspace, and Harris offers a deeper glimpse into this partnership than we have ever seen before. Finally, Harris explains what the new cybersecurity regime means for all of us, who spend our daily lives bound to the Internet — and are vulnerable to its dangers.
About the Author
SHANE HARRIS is the author of The Watchers: The Rise of America's Surveillance State, which won the New York Public Library’s Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism and was named one of the best books of 2010 by the Economist. Harris won the 2010 Gerald R. Ford Prize for Distinguished Reporting on National Defense. He is currently Senior Correspondent at the Daily Beast, covering national security, intelligence, and cyber security. He is also an ASU fellow at New America, where he researches the future of war. Previously, he was senior writer at the Washingtonian, and his work has appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Slate, the Daily Beast, the Washington Post, and numerous other publications. He has provided analysis and commentary for CNN, NPR, the BBC, and many other media organizations and radio stations.
Table of Contents
A Note on Sources ix
Prologue xii
Part I
The First Cyber War 3
RTRG 25
Building the Cyber Army 39
The Internet Is a Battlefield 69
The Enemy Among Us 83
The Mercenaries 103
Cops Become Spies 123
Part II
“Another Manhattan Project” 139
Buckshot Yankee 146
The Secret Sauce 153
The Corporate Counterstrike 171
Spring Awakening 187
The Business of Defense 198
At the Dawn 216
Acknowledgments 229
Notes 233
Index 252