Top 10 Security, Technology, and Business Books of 2023
November 27, 2023
The year 2023 felt incredibly disruptive and my annual reading list probably reflects that fact as I sought out books that focused not only on managing risk and chaos, but recognizing and fostering disruptive technology opportunties. Five years ago, I recommended Kevin Roberts’ excellent book “64 Shots” which talked about surviving in a VUCA (volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity) world and 2023 definitely qualified as a VUCA year. It was also a year to remember that there are bad actors in every domain and that being in the cultural zeitgeist doesn’t automatically qualify you as a good leader. The 2023 list is now up on OODA Loop.…
My Top 10 Security, Technology and Business books of 2022
January 12, 2023
Head on over to OODAloop.com for my top 10 books of 2022.
Top 10 Security, Technology, and Business Books of 2022
Happy 25th Anniversary to the Terrorism Research Center
April 19, 2021
Today marks the 25th anniversary since the founding of the Terrorism Research Center. I think I captured the continuing legacy of the TRC well in my 20th anniversary note, so sharing below for broader distribution. Twenty years. If you had told me twenty years ago that an initiative with two friends over an elk dinner would be measuring its impact in decades, I'd have thought your perspective to be a bit ambitious. Yet here we are, twenty years later and the Terrorism Research Center legacy is still having an immeasurable influence on our homeland and international security. Many of the TRC initiatives from the past decade are still having a self-sustaining impact as official programs within DHS and other organizations. Nearly 15 years…
A Letter on the Morality of Using Information Warfare Weapons in 1993
April 4, 2021
I'm not sure who I wrote this letter to in 1993/94, but I'm guessing maybe my mentor Daniel T Kuehl given the discussion about warfare. I found it while digging up an old report for Bob Gourley. I'm clearly trying to make sense of the strategic and moral implications of Information Warfare. By the time I wrote my thesis a year later, I had moved away from the crossbow and focused on the Conoidal Bullet and Bushnell's Turtle (early submarine warfare) as applicable analogies. -----------------1993/94 Letter to unknown ------------ Thinking about the relationship to nuclear weapons. I’ve been thinking about Mueller’s argument about the moral implications of fighting nuclear war or general wars and how he thinks there is a global conscience or…
Most Popular Posts of 2019
December 24, 2019
I publish most of my content at OODAloop.com these days, but thought I'd document for the blog, the most popular pieces of content from 2019. The Third Decade Problems Deception Needs to be an Essential Element of Your Cyber Defense Strategy A Traveling Executive’s Guide to Cybersecurity The Five Modes of HACKthink Top 10 Security, Technology, and Business Books of 2019 Here’s What the New U.S. Intelligence Strategy Says About Cyber Threats Securing AI – Four Areas to Focus on Right Now How a Presidential Commission Was Tracking Hackers in 1996 The Hackers Who Saved the World – Interview with Author Joe Menn OODA Trends 2019 Which CIA Executive Impacted Snowden’s OODA Loop? Russia 2020 – What Will Putin Do Next? What You Should Know About…
Top 10 Security, Technology and Business Books of 2019
December 2, 2019
My annual compilation of best books for the year 2019 is now live at OODA Loop. I read over 100 books to select the ten best of the year. Also, please consider subscribing to my weekly email newsletter that tracks the top cyber and technology stories of the week and provides one book review per week as well. Subscribe at www.globalfrequency.com - Thanks!
Top 10 Security, Technology, and Business Books of 2019
The Third Decade Problems
January 8, 2019
Meaningful work is the opus of a successful career and over the past two decades, I’ve had the humbling honor of working impactfully on important issues. In the early and mid-90’s, I helped identify the next generation of conflict in the cyber domain and worked to prepare the United States and our Allies for cyber-enabled operations. I was a founding executive at iDefense which spearheaded the cyber intelligence field and would guide iSight Partners through a critical growth period a decade later. At the Terrorism Research Center we worked tirelessly on counterterrorism related issues and when the world shifted on September 11, we were well positioned to provide valuable training, research, analysis and other critical…
Top 10 Security, Technology and Business Books of 2018
January 5, 2019
My annual compilation of top books is up over at OODA Loop. Enjoy. Top 10 Security Technology and Business Books of 2018 - OODA
Top 10 Security, Business, and Technology books of 2017
December 9, 2017
I've compiled my annual list of top books. Not your typical top ten list. Check it out at OODA Loop
Best Security, Business, and Technology Books of 2016
December 15, 2016
"Dozens of times per year, I get asked to recommend my favorite books so I couldn’t say no when the OODA Loop team asked me to build on Mark Mateski’s popular Red Teaming book list by providing my top 10 books for 2016. I have very eclectic interests, so I’ve focused my list on the top security, business, and technology books of 2016. Given that I’ve always drawn on fiction for both inspiration and insight, the list also includes three very compelling works of fiction that should be of interest to those in the security and technology fields. Please feel free to share your thoughts and recommendations with me via twitter @MattDevost. Happy reading!" Source: OODA Loop - Best Security, Business, and Technology Books of 2016
Autonomous AI guards to stalk the internet fighting hackers
October 10, 2016
"The Grand Cyber Challenge at the Black Hat cybersecurity conference in Las Vegas pitted artificial intelligences against each other, while their human creators sat back and watched. Fighting for a $4 million prize pot from the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), each AI tried to hack its opponents’ computer systems. They sought weak spots and figured out how to exploit them while defending their own computers. The sophistication of the artificial hackers impressed many of those present. ‘This really caught me by surprise,’ says Matt Devost of cybersecurity firm FusionX in Washington DC. It could transform the security scene in the next 10 years, he says." Source: Autonomous AI guards to stalk the internet fighting…
Ransomware: Lucrative, fast growing, hard to stop
September 28, 2016
"'I imagine it will hit into the millions of dollars, if they are able to infect some of the right types of targets in an enterprise environment,' said Devost. Like smart start-up CEOs, the hackers are testing the market and refining the business model. As the vast majority of attacks are likely settled without going public, more research is needed to figure out just how profitable the business really is, said experts. Unlike the criminal networks, which often share information freely, many of the victims do not." Source: Ransomware: Lucrative, fast growing, hard to stop
Ransomware Poses a Rising Threat to Hospital Operations
September 28, 2016
"Because of the potential to disrupt their operations, hospitals are logical targets for attacks. If infected, they may have little choice but to pay the ransom—and quickly, said Matt Devost, CEO of security consultancy FusionX, which is now owned by Accenture. 'If I target a midtier, medium-sized business and encrypt their data, there is probably a period of time during which they can operate without access to their data,' he told eWEEK. 'With hospitals, that is not the case, and that makes them a ripe target.'" Source: Ransomware Poses a Rising Threat to Hospital Operations
How accurate is Mr. Robot? The show’s data, password, and smart home dangers.
September 28, 2016
"It’s often as simple as that. When I was researching my book, Dark Territory: The Secret History of Cyber War, Matt Devost, president and CEO of the cybersecurity firm FusionX, told me about his days running the ‘red team’ in war games that tested the vulnerability of NATO communications systems. In one game, Devost was having a hard time cracking the commanding general’s password. So he looked up his biographical sketch on a military website, tried out some of the personal details it cited, and finally hit gold by combining ‘Rutgers,’ where the general’s son was attending college, with a two-digit number, which a commercially available random-numbers generator guessed in less than a second." Source: How accurate is Mr. Robot? The show’s…
Can hackers sway public opinion with DNC and NSA leaks?
September 28, 2016
"'The first entree into cyberconflict isn’t physical destruction,' says Matthew Devost, President of FusionX, a cybersecurity and risk management company. 'If an airplane with 200 people falls out of the sky, it’s very easy to determine our response. But with the DNC hack, the impact isn’t as tangible.'" Source: Can hackers sway public opinion with DNC and NSA leaks? - CSMonitor.com
HfS #CyberChat w Accenture’s Matt Devost
September 28, 2016
"In this edition of #CyberChat, Fred McClimans of HfS Research sits down with Matt Devost, Managing Director of Accenture's Vulnerability and Threat Intelligence Practice to discuss the state of Cyber Security and the trends moving enterprise security forward." Source: HfS #CyberChat w Accenture's Matt Devost - YouTube