breakpoint

I get this book in the mail. It's by Richard A. Clarke and its called breakpoint. If I'm not in front of a computer terminal, pda or a cell phone...I'm usually reading. However I've only read about 6 novels in my life. I suppose it's kind of weird.

So this book is special in several respects. I'd read Against All Enemies, written by the same author, a few years back and thought it was pretty cool to get a first hand account of government action, reaction and inaction around that time. The book came from a special person that got it for me at a book signing, with a note from the author.

I had to read it. I'm not a good judge of good fiction, but this did not strike me as particularly well written. It did however well exceed the purpose of exposing aspects of the non-fictional world that I find of keen interest. Those aspects happen to be related to how fragile our computerized, pda and cellphone world are. And how that fragility is manifested by using the very infrastructure that allow us to live our lives as we do today, against itself.

I first heard this in the 90s from Peter Neumann at a USENIX con. The idea that the more fast and efficient networks get, the more risk there is that they can be used against themselves. As it turns out this applies to most everything from an information security standpoint.

Now I can say I've read about seven novels in my life....