Schneier on Security

Data and Goliath by Bruce Schneier is an eye-opening look into the secret operations of our country’s surveillance operations.  Through his analysis of the classified information leaked by former CIA contractor, Edward Snowden, Bruce breaks down the impacts that mass surveillance is having on society.  He brings immense insights into how government and societies need to rectify the power imbalance and work to restore privacy and trust.  While many of Bruce’s recommendations involve broad, overarching changes to legislation, there are several principles that security professionals can adopt to do our part—such as building resilience into our systems and processes; fixing vulnerabilities; upholding trust; and not subverting products or standards…

After sitting in my reading list for years, I finally got to read “Data and Goliath” by Bruce Schneier. Overall, this book is as well written as all of Schneier’s books, and is just as scientifically accurate (to the best that I could tell). However, whoever the audience for his book is, they may find it missing essential parts that make it not just a pleasant read, but also a useful one.

This book is written so clearly that reading it will flow well for security professionals and the general public alike. I recommended it to a few acquaintances who are not security savvy nor even technologists, but who should know more about the information exchange ecosystem that they fuel with their personal data…

Skepticism was the attitude governing my state of mind when I stared reading this book but it vanished as soon as I realized it challenged one of my deepest beliefs, namely: My life is so ordinary that no one, in their right minds, would bother monitor the routines. Out of my personal reflex as a psychiatrist I attributed paranoid tendencies to those concerned about being surveilled with the use of electronic devices. It might be that at an individual level, one’s life is not of primary interest, unless one is a public figure or is prosecuted for some sort of crime, but at a global level, the individual becomes an inexhaustible source of useful information no matter how mediocre their lives are and this is what the author wants to highlight from the very beginning…

We all surrender privacy in some form and fashion and allow companies to gather data so these enterprises can better serve us. Our cell phone provider needs to know where we are to route calls to the appropriate cell tower. As consumers and users, we allow the cell phone company to track and follow our moves because the convenience of being able to receive a call is greater than our perceived loss of privacy. For the last twenty years, Americans have accepted that the benefit of convenience outweighs the loss of privacy. Bruce Schneier makes a strong argument that this construct should no longer be the case. The book Data and Goliath has a compelling message that is a Red Thread of a question through the text: ���Do you accept the surrender of your data for convenience?” The author is an authority in the field of cybersecurity—a renowned computer scientist and cryptographer. Schneier has been at the forefront of cybersecurity developments since the 1990s with an appetite to address current challenges and put them in perspective…

How many times have you heard the “Nothing to Hide” argument? If you don’t have anything to hide, then you don’t need to worry about anyone watching you or collecting information about your thoughts and behaviors. Consider the impact to those that have nothing to hide. Depending on who is watching, people will curtail open discussion on many topics which stifle new thinking, innovation and even market disruption. Furthermore, it becomes easier to categorize and, therefore, discriminate against individuals. Privacy in our communications is much more important than most people think. And, a lack of information transparency in collection and use of data keeps this issue off the radar for most everyday people…