Intercept is the previously untold - and highly classified - story of the melding of technology and espionage. Gordon Corera's compelling narrative takes us from the Second World War through the Cold War and the birth of the internet to the present era of hackers and surveillance. Rich with historical detail and characters, as well as astonishing revelations about espionage carried out in recent times by the UK, US and China, this is the secret history of how spying drove the rise of the computer.
Within the confines of Britain's Second World War code-breaking establishment at Bletchley Park, the work of men like Alan Turing led to the birth of electronic espionage and the first computer, Colossus. In the following decades, computers have transformed the business of espionage, from Cold War spy hunting to today's data-driven pursuit of terrorists and industrial-scale cyber-espionage against corporations. As computers become increasingly pervasive, the intertwining forces of computers and espionage are reshaping the entire world; what was once the preserve of a few intelligence agencies now affects us all.
Using unique access to GCHQ, the NSA, Chinese officials and senior executives from some of the most powerful global technology companies, Gordon Corera has gathered compelling stories from heads of state, hackers and spies of all stripes. Intercept is a ground-breaking exploration of the new space in which the worlds of espionage, geopolitics, diplomacy, international business, science and technology collide.
Editorial Reviews
"Never mind all those cold-war thrillers set in 1970s Berlin. The true golden age of spying and surveillance - whether carried out by states or, increasingly, by companies - is now" --Economist
"Gordon Corera, best known as the security correspondent for BBC News, somehow finds time to write authoritative, well-researched and readable books on intelligence. Here he explores the evolution of computers from what used to be called signals intelligence to their transforming role in today's intelligence world. The result is an informative, balanced and revealing survey of the field in which, I suspect, most experts will find something new" --Alan Judd, Spectator
"Bleakly entertaining ... The lesson of Intercept is that secret information is power, and that there is no end to the struggle to capture it and control it." --Richard Walker, CapX
"If you are looking for a clear and comprehensive guide to how communications have been intercepted, from cable-cutting in the First World War to bulk data collection exposed by Ed Snowden, this is it ... A most readable account of how computers and the internet have transformed spying" --Richard Norton-Taylor, Guardian
About the Author
Gordon Corera is Security Correspondent for BBC News, and has presented major documentaries for the BBC on GCHQ, NSA and cybersecurity including Crypto Wars and Under Attack: Espionage, Sabotage, Subversion and Warfare in the Cyber Age for Radio 4. He is the author of the The Art of Betrayal: Life and Death in the British Secret Service and Shopping for Bombs: The Rise and Fall of the AQ Khan Network. In 2014 he was named Information Security Journalist of the Year at the Information Security and Journalism Awards.
