Beyond fear
thinking sensibly about security in an uncertain world
by Bruce Schneier · first published 2003
57% recommend43% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Offers a practical mental framework for thinking sensibly about security and risk, applicable beyond computing to everyday real-world threats. Its clear reasoning and lasting relevance stand out.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
Do we really need national ID cards? Is it a good idea for pilots to carry pistols? Schneier makes the complex topic of security easy to comprehend. Using Schneier's 5-point method for analyzing any kind of security solution, he shows the reader how to become a well-informed security consumer.
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…De Soto - Pathologies Of Power, Paul Farmer - Metaphors We Live By, George Lakoff - Seeing Like A State, James Scott - Ishmael, Daniel Quinn - Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman, Richard Feynman - Beyond Fear, Bruce Schneier - The Omnivore's Dilemma, Michael Pollan - The Birth Of Plenty, William Bernstein
on “Ask HN: book suggestions in non-tech fields (e.g. psychology, philosophy…)” ↗Beyond Fear - Schneier Sources of Power - Klein. This guy did research on how experts made decisions under stressful situations. Normal Accidents - Perrow Emergence - Johnson
on “Ask HN: Books That Gratify One's Intellectual Curiosity?” ↗Also recommended reading are Bruce Schneier's book "Beyond Fear" which provides a great mental framework for thinking about security (mainly IRL, but with applications in computing) http://www.schneier.com/book-beyondfear.html and his blog: http://www.schneier.com/
on “No More Fear” ↗I would recommend the following book: Bruce Schneier - Beyond Fear: Thinking Sensibly About Security in an Uncertain World http://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Fear-Thinking-Sensibly-Uncertai...
on “Ask HN: Book recommendations?” ↗…you truly believe evil companies are the problem force them to follow the law if you think the laws are in adequate lobby for new ones. Political passivity is not the answer. I highly recommend reading Beyond Fear by Bruce Schneier [1]. [1] https://www.schneier.com/books/beyond_fear/
on “Tyson Foods CEO: The Future of Food Might Be Meatless” ↗Schneier at least has substantial experience and analysis on public policy - his "Beyond Fear" book published over a decade ago is one example.
on “Bugs in our pockets: the risks of client-side scanning” ↗…Stop making reactive decisions. If something bad happened on a total, extremely unlikely lark, don't act like it's going to happen again next week. This is a central theme in Bruce Schneier's 2003 book Beyond Fear, which I continue to recommend 20 years after I first read it.
on “Egoless Engineering” ↗…airports is mostly security theater to make passengers feel safe. People are generally not afraid of terrorists hijacking or bombing trains, so security theater isn't necessary there. Bruce Schneier book "beyond fear" is over 20 years old and not outdated a bit.
on “Masks, Smoke, and Mirrors: The story of EgyptAir flight 804” ↗…Let's look at how to do that. * Secrets and Lies - Security isn't about crypto, we need to think about the whole of networking and infrastructure. Here's how to think about security more generally. * Beyond Fear - Security is an innate part of how we think, but we need to understand how to actually think about it in the first place. * Liars and Outliers - What is security? What does it do, why do we need it,…
on “What I've Been Thinking About” ↗As Bruce Schneier points out in his book Beyond Fear humans are very bad at assessing risk accurately. Ask yourself how scared are you of terrorist attacks vs. heart disease. Notice how the government is putting much more money into the terrorist attack…
on “Before Prosecuting, Investigate the Government” ↗From his bio, I would reduce his mile long credentials to the following: - wrote a best seller "applied cryptography" - wrote "secrets and lies" (not a best seller) - wrote "beyond fear" - wrote "schneier on security" - publishes a monthly newsletter - chief security officer of bt.com The rest of the bio: http://www.schneier.com/about.html ...essentially amounts to what publications…
on “Schneier removed from TSA oversight meeting at TSA request ” ↗…and destroys wealth. Kind of like a second 9/11, with less intensity. So I guess it does way more harm than good. And please, don't mod this as a troll; that's basically the thesis of Schneier's book "Beyond fear".
on “Schneier: The War on the Unexpected” ↗…than the value of the assets under protection B) where the time it takes to attack the system is long enough for the attack to be detected. C.f. Bruce Schneier's book: https://www.schneier.com/books/beyond_fear/
on “Facebook Stored Hundreds of Millions of User Passwords in Plain Text for Years” ↗The technical term is "Security Theater" coined by Bruce Schneier for his book Beyond Fear. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_theater
on “Hitchens: The truth about airplane security measures” ↗…comes up in biometrics a lot. E.g. using fingerprints + facial geometry to identify someone is much less accurate than using either one or the other. Bruce Schneier has written about this in his book Beyond Fear, and I'm sure there are explanations online somewhere.
on “IPhone 4S has GLONASS in addition to GPS” ↗