Amazon.com Review
Computer security holds a unique position among information technology disciplines. Because threats to systems are so numerous and varied, you can spend years studying them (and general strategies for counteracting them) before you start to work with specific security tools. Defending Your Digital Assets Against Hackers, Crackers, Spies and Thieves is a guide to computer security that remains one step back from security software itself. In place of specific how-to information, readers learn about the motives of online attackers and the strategies they use to gain unauthorized access to systems and data, plus overarching concepts like public-key cryptography. They also find out about defensive and forensic strategies for preventing attacks and limiting their potency when they occur.

The authors of this book--a cryptographer, a couple of mathematicians, and a handful of others--employ a very text-heavy presentation style that's best suited to attentive study. The prose tends to be dense and a bit academic, and certain conceptual diagrams approach inscrutability. Still, security is a complicated matter, and a simplistic treatment wouldn't be as useful. It's possible to scan the index for a topic that interests you--keystroke biometrics, say--and find a definition and a statement of pros and cons. You'll also find endnote references to more specialized works but little mention of software products that implement the ideas the authors explain. --David Wall

Topics covered: Computer and network security, including risk management, security policy, cryptography, access control, authentication, biometrics, actions to be taken during an attack, and case studies of hacking and information warfare.