Messing with the Enemy
Surviving in a Social Media World of Hackers, Terrorists, Russians, and Fake News
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
A former FBI Special Agent and leading cyber-security expert offers a devastating and essential look at the misinformation campaigns, fake news, and electronic espionage operations that have become the cutting edge of modern warfare—and how we can protect ourselves and our country against them.
Clint Watts electrified the nation when he testified in front of the House Intelligence Committee regarding Russian interference in the 2016 election. In Messing with the Enemy, the cyber and homeland security expert introduces us to a frightening world in which terrorists and cyber criminals don’t hack your computer, they hack your mind. Watts reveals how these malefactors use your information and that of your friends and family to work for them through social media, which they use to map your social networks, scour your world affiliations, and master your fears and preferences.
Thanks to the schemes engineered by social media manipulators using you and your information, business executives have coughed up millions in fraudulent wire transfers, seemingly good kids have joined the Islamic State, and staunch anti-communist Reagan Republicans have cheered the Russian government’s hacking of a Democratic presidential candidate’s e-mails. Watts knows how they do it because he’s mirrored their methods to understand their intentions, combat their actions, and coopt their efforts.
Watts examines a particular social media platform—from Twitter to internet Forums to Facebook to LinkedIn—and a specific bad actor—from al Qaeda to the Islamic State to the Russian and Syrian governments—to illuminate exactly how social media tracking is used for nefarious purposes. He explains how he’s learned, through his successes and his failures, to engage with hackers, terrorists, and even the Russians—and how these interactions have generated methods of fighting back. Shocking, funny, and eye-opening, Messing with the Enemy is a deeply urgent guide for living safe and smart in a super-connected world.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Counterterrorism expert Watts writes a timely, occasionally chilling account of the use and misuse of social media by a variety of geopolitical players. He traces the rise of social media platforms looking well beyond Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube to illustrate how many have been used for a variety of nefarious ends, such as influencing potential voters or radicalizing potential terrorists. Watts uses examples ranging from early social platforms such as Yahoo Groups, which were meeting places for like-minded extremists, to more recent dating apps, which have been used to gather personal or compromising information on users to make the case that all platforms are vulnerable to misuse. He finishes with advice on coping with social media's effects on contemporary life. He peppers his analysis with his personal experiences pulling communications-based pranks at West Point, interacting with a U.S.-born al-Qaeda operative on Twitter, identifying internet trolls, and falling victim to viral misinformation (aka fake news), demonstrating his expertise while showing just how easy it is to be affected by bad actors on social media. Watts combines a down-to-earth voice with an ability to recreate moments of social media troublemaking to discomfiting, informative effect.
Customer Reviews
For Every American to Read
We have to wake up to the propaganda to the current White House occupants and the Russians.
Don’t let the “Firehouse of Falsehoods” blathered by the current White House occupants continue to erode our democracy. Don’t be brainwashed.
Thanks Clint Watts for helping us to understand the evil that is prevailing.
Thought provoking read
If you have seen the movie “Idiocracy” (2006, by Mike Judge) then you will see familiar themes in this more serious warning of America’s future. Although Mr. Watts might be offended by the comparison of his book to the movie, Clint explains how the public can come to believe electrolytes will solve problems. But on a more serious note, his writing underscores the need for a unified US strategy to combat what he calls a “War on Information”. Articulate, reasoned and thought out, but a bit conspiratory in places, he lays out bare for all to see the power - both positive and negative - of how crowds use preferences instead of compromise to solve problems. The ending is a bit dark that leaves you wondering about his message. I believe he is sincere, or is he?
Verify your hearing test
Albeit not a physician, I wonder if you misrepresented the test used to test your daughter’s hearing. An echocardiogram typically refers to studies of the heart.