Nicole Perlroth: This is How They Tell Me the World Ends

In This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race, New York Times cybersecurity reporter Nicole Perlroth reveals the untold story of the cyberweapons market—the most secretive, invisible, government-backed market on earth. This important book offers a terrifying first look at a new kind of global warfare.

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Zero day: a software bug that allows a hacker to break into your devices and move around undetected. One of the most coveted tools in a spy’s arsenal, a zero day has the power to silently spy on your iPhone, dismantle the safety controls at a chemical plant, alter an election, and shut down the electric grid (just ask Ukraine).

For decades, under cover of classification levels and non-disclosure agreements, the United States government became the world’s dominant hoarder of zero days. U.S. government agents paid top dollar—first thousands, and later millions of dollars—to hackers willing to sell their lock-picking code and their silence.