In This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends Nicole Perlroth provides another explanation for the ever-expanding cyberassaults on the United States ... This is no bloodless, just-the-facts chronicle. Written in the hot, propulsive prose of a spy thriller, Perlroth’s book sets out from the start to scare us out of our complacency — and (on my part, at least) it succeeds. As a narrator, Perlroth comes at the reader hard, like an angry Cassandra who has spent the last seven years of her life (which is both the length of her career at The Times and more or less the time she spent working on the book) unmasking the signs of our impending doom — only to be ignored again and again ... This is all compelling stuff, and Perlroth makes a strong, data-driven case for action ... The book’s relative lack of access to policymakers and -making also proves an obstacle at the book’s end, where Perlroth offers a few short pages on how to deal with the very scary problems she’s highlighted in the preceding 400 pages. Many of her suggestions are sensible, but also feel like long shots ... Still, Perlroth has done a valuable service in highlighting the need for big changes in how America approaches its cybersecurity ...
Scarier than the scariest sci-fi movie, This Is How They Tell Me The World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race, Ms. Perlroth’s stunningly detailed, must-read book tells the untold story of what may well be the clearest and most present danger facing the world ... Hoping against hope that these recommendations will get some traction soon, Nicole Perlroth indicates that she is keeping her fingers crossed that the next cyber attack will not come during the pandemic.
A sobering account of a thoroughly hacked and cyberattacked world ... A powerful case for strong cybersecurity policy that reduces vulnerabilities while respecting civil rights.
Perlroth debuts with a colorful rundown of threats to the world’s digital infrastructure ... Perlroth’s searing account of the role American hubris played in creating the zero-day market hits the mark, but she leaves many technical details about cyberweapons unexplained, and stuffs the book with superfluous details about getting her sources to spill. This breathless account raises alarms but adds little of substance to the debate over cyberweapons.
Cybersecurity journalist Perlroth’s terrifying revelation of how vulnerable American institutions and individuals are to clandestine cyberattacks by malicious hackers is possibly the most important book of the year. Perlroth spent seven years researching, traveling the world, and conducting hundreds of interviews about the elusive market for zero-day software bugs that allow a hacker to break into devices undetected and either implant malware, extract data, or take control of entire systems ... That makes Perlroth’s precise, lucid, and compelling presentation of mind-blowing disclosures about the underground arms race a must-read exposé.
