A Hacker's Mind: How the Powerful Bend Society's Rules, and How to Bend them Back

by Bruce Schneier

It’s not just computers―hacking is everywhere.

Legendary cybersecurity expert and New York Times best-selling author Bruce Schneier reveals how using a hacker’s mindset can change how you think about your life and the world. A hack is any means of subverting a system’s rules in unintended ways. The tax code isn’t computer code, but a series of complex formulas. It has vulnerabilities; we call them “loopholes.” We call exploits “tax avoidance strategies.” And there is an entire industry of “black hat” hackers intent on finding exploitable loopholes in the tax code. We call them accountants and tax attorneys. In A Hacker’s Mind , Bruce Schneier takes hacking out of the world of computing and uses it to analyze the systems that underpin our society: from tax laws to financial markets to politics. He reveals an array of powerful actors whose hacks bend our economic, political, and legal systems to their advantage, at the expense of everyone else. Once you learn how to notice hacks, you’ll start seeing them everywhere―and you’ll never look at the world the same way again. Almost all systems have loopholes, and this is by design. Because if you can take advantage of them, the rules no longer apply to you. Unchecked, these hacks threaten to upend our financial markets, weaken our democracy, and even affect the way we think. And when artificial intelligence starts thinking like a hacker―at inhuman speed and scale―the results could be catastrophic. But for those who would don the “white hat,” we can understand the hacking mindset and rebuild our economic, political, and legal systems to counter those who would exploit our society. And we can harness artificial intelligence to improve existing systems, predict and defend against hacks, and realize a more equitable world.

Genres: Nonfiction, Technology, Politics, Audiobook, Business, Psychology, Computers

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2023

About the author

Bruce Schneier is a renowned security technologist, called a “security guru” by the Economist. He has written more than one dozen books, including the New York Times bestseller Data and Goliath (2014) and Click Here to Kill Everybody (2018). He teaches at the Harvard Kennedy School and lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Reviews

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[Jake · Rating 4 out of 5]

When you think of a hacker, you might think of greasy scammers, or Russian agents. Or the heroes of thrillers like The Matrix. But it turns out hackers are all around us. A hack is any action that subverts the rules and intentions of a system while still working within the system. Or, as the author puts it in the introduction, remember how kid's ant farms didn't come with the ants and you'd have to write to an address to get them? A normal person will see that and think "Cool, that's how I get my ants." A hacker thinks "Cool, that's how I can mail a bunch of ants to my enemies!"

So just who are these hackers? Mostly, the very rich and very powerful. Tax loopholes are hacks. Gerrymandering is a hack. Online scams are hacks. And if you can get in charge of those systems--either directly or indirectly, or curry some influence with the people who do control them--in order to make sure those hacks stay in place and/or continue to benefit you, now you're really hacking. We see how time and time again, the rich and powerful use hacks to get richer and more powerful. And pretty soon AI is going to hack those systems. Or just hack us.

What's a normal person to do? Unfortunately the "how to bend them back" of the title is a little thin. The solution, Bruce Schneier say, is robust and transparent regulation. However, we just read five chapters about how the rich and powerful hack regulations to their favor. It's a very good book, but the present state of elites hacking normal people is dim, and its only going to get worse.

[Melissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This review is based on an advance reading copy.

The overall idea behind this book to show the reader that everything is a system and that all systems can be hacked. Basically, this expands what most people think of as "hacks" from the hoodie wearing computer guru mashing keys and saying "I'm in" to what we tend to think of as more of loopholes - in laws, the tax code, social and financial systems, and our brains. There is nothing new or mind blowing here, but I suppose this could be an interesting book for people who aren't used to seeing the world this way.

The book is very repetitive and dull. It gives only a very high level, superficial view of these hacks. Many potentially interesting examples are mentioned, but that is it....they are just mentioned. Schneier doesn't go into any of them in any depth. There isn't more than a short paragraph on any example.

There is also very little on "how to bend them back". It is more of a "the government needs to do this" than much of anything individuals can do.

This 250 page book has 60 chapters, which I guess is a cognitive hack to help me finish it. When the chapters are only about 4 pages long it is easy to force myself to read just one more.

[Jari Pirhonen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book about hackers' mentality and hacking. Note, that hacking IT systems is just a small part of the book. The book discuss hacking financial systems, legal systems, political systems, etc. Possible consequences of artificial intelligence hacking the systems is also discussed. Technical expertise is not needed to read this book.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

I expected a book about how computer programs have been and could be hacked but it soon expanded the definition of hacking into a cautionary tale about how regulations, laws, and social systems can be hacked for financial gain and power.
Thanks to W. W. Norton and NetGalley for this ARC to review.

[Marjorie · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5

[Macho · Rating 2 out of 5]

I usually love reading Bruce Schneier: no one else understands digital security so well and explains it in such easily understandable terms. Unfortunately this offering is a bit of a dud. Here he explains what a "hack" is in the computer context, and then tries to apply the notion to various other contexts, like hacks of the stock market or hacks of biology/evolution, hacks of the tax code by the wealthy, etc. The first roughly 80% of the book is just examples of clever hacks in various domains which are amusing, but don't really seem to go anywhere. In the last 20% of the book he describes how AI is going to facilitate hacks in all of these domains and how they'll be misused by the wealthy to their own advantage. He also aims to put forward a coherent analysis of the consequences and the strategies to resist it, but he fails to really successfully do either due to his inability to really identify economic inequality itself as really being at or near the root of these problems, and instead coming up a grab bag of band-aid half measures.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hackers aren’t hooded teenagers behind computer screens filled with binary text. They’re mostly in executive suites, political office, and black-tie events. The rich and powerful can employ hacks to get whatever they want, because they are rich and powerful. And hacks aren’t tied to computer systems. Any system is hackable, and most of them will be hacked at some point.

Elections can be hacked by outside parties looking to influence political strategy. Unemployment benefits can be hacked by government to minimize the number of people who actually get them by deliberately making the process of registering and using these benefits shrouded in poor information or annoyingly long. The tax system can be hacked by employing tactics like the Double Irish with a Dutch Sandwich (yes, that’s what they called it) (no, you can’t use it, it only applied to corporations), or by sneaking in clauses into legislation right before they’re passed.

Our brains were designed to keep us alive in a world that would hunt us for food. We react strongly and pay most attention to stimuli with bright lights, loud sounds, and colorful text. We try to humanize everything, we try to associate a face to two dots and a line. OpenAI is (potentially) spending millions replying to pleases and thank yous sent to ChatGPT. It’s why every virtual assistant has a name, from Siri to Alexa to Bixby to the Roomba that became your parents’ favorite child after you moved out. Needless to say, this is something that can be hacked. Have you heard of a little company that makes really cool stories centered around characters with too-big eyes? It’s called Disney, and I don’t want to know how many millions and billions they’ve made.

I think of AI as a prodigious child. It’s going to accelerate all the hacks we’ve ever seen in ways that we don’t expect, because AI only plays by the rules that it’s been fed. If you don’t feed it morality or social norms, it won’t account for them. If you just ask a super intelligent robot to get you some coffee, you might expect it to go pour some from the coffee machine, but it might buy you some coffee beans from the store. How is it supposed to know you meant liquid coffee from the machine? So AI will discover hacks we won’t think of, because it’s not human and therefore doesn’t understand culture or society.

This was a good read, but it dragged a little. The point about rich people hacking the system and getting away with it because they’re rich felt a little too dead from all the hammering by halfway through the book. I learned a lot, but I think I could have learned all it had to offer in half the number of pages.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think I may have loved this book partially because of my day job (cyber security). Even though the book itself is not so much about computer hacking as it is the hacker’s mindset and the social, technological, legal, and human constraints and environments that make people, systems, and laws hackable, it was thoroughly enjoyable because it challenged me to look at the works differently. This book is especially important with emerging technologies and the digital ethics that must be but are but often enough considered when innovation is at work. It also points out another reason why the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, why the equity gap between the privileged and disadvantaged keeps growing, and why social and economical injustice will persist. I feel like I just sat in his class essentially, for free (he teaches at Harvard).

[J. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you to #GoodreadsGiveaway for providing me an advance copy of Bruce Schneier’s latest security book, A Hacker’s Mind: How the Powerful Bend Society’s Rules, and How to Bend Them Back, in exchange for an honest review.

#AHackersMind is security expert Bruce Schneider’s latest nonfiction work. Instead of focusing solely on tech, the author applies hacking principles to offline frameworks, such as legal systems, real estate, sports, banking, and politics, along with various digital systems, including AI, robots, ATMs, airlines, and casinos. The book is divided into seven parts based on a system category that contain five or more short chapters, depending on the subject matter.

The work was clearly written for the general public, as opposed to industry and legal experts. On the one hand, the information provides a generic overview of complex topics in a succinct and digestible format. It is a great resource for those looking to learn more and wanting to know where to begin their research. On the other hand, those who are already experts or are looking for an in-depth view on the subjects may need to supplement this with a more substantial or individual work (e.g., a book solely focused on hacking AI or bank software).

The other positive (or negative, depending on your needs) is that the pages are clean and omit any pesky footnotes at the bottom of every page; though it is lacking from an expert perspective and relies on very little resources (he is an expert after all) provided as notes in the back of the work.

I’d recommend it for the average reader looking to get into this space or those wanting to learn interesting facts about how we arrived at where we are in time in regard to technology, politics, economics, legal, and social systems.

[Jeevan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very well written summary of hacks in different walks of life. The author explains all of them in the context of programming. Most of the topics are well known but the presentation of topics including the author's own hacking of the airline boarding pass system were interesting nuggets. With the dawn of GPT(n)' the last chapter on AI hacking is the most relevant for modern times. Hopefully we will have a HGS soon. Highly recommend this book.

[Quintessens · Rating 4 out of 5]

Don’t think that the title is accurate. More of an overview of all the outward forms of hacks. But not less interesting. The real ‘juice’ is at the end where one learns the ways in which our minds are hacked on a daily basis: the Minority Report has already become reality.

If I’ve understood the message correctly, we can’t avoid what’s coming but we can be prepared; “The future belongs to those who prepare for it today”

[K · Rating 1 out of 5]

Very repetitive with very few original ideas. Reads like an introductory textbook at best.

[emelin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book because it explains who and what hacking is beyond the stereotypical IT hackers.

[Peggy Sue 33 · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was very insightful-it was a good vacation read for me.

[Claudiu Leoveanu-Condrei · Rating 4 out of 5]

A bit too thin for my taste, but generally not that bad. The AI section is surprisingly well-written and relevant.

[JW · Rating 4 out of 5]

An essential read to understand the philosophy--and long history--of hacking.

[Tom · Rating 3 out of 5]

Such a broad definition of hack.

[Patrick Henley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book. The author helps you to see the concept of hacking in a very different way.

[Nickole · Rating 4 out of 5]

OK technically I listen to this book but they did not have an audiobook edition. Since it was an audiobook let's get out of the way it's read very well by the narrator. Now I picked up this book because it was going to help me think like a hacker... Maybe some inside tips… Backdoor strategies… Instead the book essentially is about how the one percent and their government elected cronies have been basically hacking the system to keep the rest of us in the down unders… Not to be confused with the upside down #strangerThings. I think the book is worth three but it's gonna piss you off… Unless you are one of the 1% taking advantage of the rest of us. I don't know that it was anything that was shocking but it was like more a oh here's the actual proof that everything I thought about the 1% in the electeds in power is on the nose! If you're somehow brainwashed and think that really rich people deserve what they have you should probably read this book… You should also probably read this book if you think somehow you're going to be one of those really rich people… Because we don't read the book and learn how they're taking advantage of the system of the time to be those rich people you're definitely not going to be one of those rich people.

[Zi · Rating 4 out of 5]

good book!

this book gave me a rather unique lens to view systems: through that of a “hacker.”

there were lots of random, interesting & odd examples of how systems work, and how it can be hacked, from software to political systems to legal systems (very interesting!) to cognitive mind.

i’m also starting to see more resemblance between software systems and social systems. both systems contain vulnerabilities, but one system has a more streamlined process and mechanism to patch these vulnerabilities than the other. unfortunately the system that lacks the ability to be patched simply end up treating newly found “hacks” as part of “that’s just how things work.” think corruption, or tax evasion; these aren’t hacks anymore, since it’s now part of the system. hacks have great impacts on how systems work.

it’s rather crucial for social systems to learn to patch vulnerabilities fast, just like how it’s done in software systems. a lot of work has to be done for this to happen, but i think it’s worth it.

[Dan Dundon · Rating 4 out of 5]

"A Hacker's Mind" starts out slowly but quickly gains some steam in subsequent chapters. First, author Bruce Schneier must explain to the reader that his idea of a hacker is greatly expanded from what most of us commonly believe to be hacking. In this expanded universe, Schneier equates the selling of indulgences in the early church to hacking as well as the actions of Donald Trump in breaking the norms of society.
However, once you get beyond this novel interpretation of hacking, the book is fascinating in recounting some of the more notorious hacking episodes of history. Nevertheless, the really scary part comes at the end of the book when Schneier talks about the perils posed by AI (artificial intelligence). After reading this segment, I now understand why some of the biggest characters in the tech industry have called for a moratorium on AI development and implementation. This is scary stuff!
We need some heavy duty regulation to make sure this potentially powerful tool or weapon is controlled correctly to benefit society rather than destroying it.
Unfortunately Schneier doesn't provide us with much of a reason to be optimistic. During most of the book he points out how everyone with the intent has been able to subvert previous tech and finance regulations. My conclusion when I closed the book was simple. The rich and powerful will learn to manipulate AI just has they have learned to manipulate earlier innovations. I don't see much potential for "bending back" rules and regulations as he maintains in the subtitle of the book.

[Tarah Wheeler · Rating 5 out of 5]

it’s hard to explain the offensive security mindset but Schneier brings it off

People who see the world orthogonally, like Bruce Schneier, are somewhat cursed. Schneier explains how, with that mindset, it’s difficult to *not* see insecurities, breaks in the system, opportunities for stressing any system using its own rules against it, and the gaps where there are assumptions instead of tested security measures.

The analogies are clear and useful, the narrative is a quick read, and Schneier actually explains a method for learning how to think like a hacker. I’ll be recommending it to the people I know who want to understand how a particular mindset can both be a problem and a prerequisite for a well-paying job.

Disclaimer: I read and gave comments on a prior version, but this is the beautiful finished product. Good work.

[Popup-ch · Rating 4 out of 5]

Schneier is mostly known as a cryptographer and security advocate. Here he looks at a larger part of the world, but using the same mindset, that of a securty auditor.

He defined 'hacking' as 'subverting the spirit of the law, without actually breaking it', and shows numerous examples, from various fields. From tax law to politics and loyalty schemes.

He consistently blames 'the rich and powerful' for creating and maintaining complex systems with loopholes, and in the end the politics get in the way of the real story.


Still a very good read

[Ali · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another solid book from Schneier on the security mindset, this time focusing on the offensive side or hacking, that is finding loopholes and subverting systems to use in ways other than their intended purpose. Schneier provides a broad view of hacking not only for information technologies but also in financial, legal and political systems. A little thin on the solutions or defensive side, but a very accessible read on designing reliable resilient systems.

[P · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is a book for extreme simpletons. The title of the book is misleading. There is almost no "how", as that word is mentioned not once but twice in the title. It's all just a bunch of what, and it's repeated over and over again, and it wasn't particularly clever or novel in the first place. It's was of no use to me in a functional or leisure sense. I would not recommend this book unless you're really naive or ignorant.

1/10

[CatReader · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of interesting ideas, presenting in ways I hadn't thought about before. Presenting hacking as ways of exploiting "the system" (whether you're talking about professional sports, airline loyalty programs, tax loopholes, etc.) that then become mainstream, and using that common thread to tie multiple industries and fields together, is an intriguing theory.

[0xd34df00d · Rating 1 out of 5]

Clear political bias, lots of cherry-picking, and barely disguisded propaganda.

Ah, and clickbait title.

[Paul · Rating 1 out of 5]

It's hard to enjoy a book when the author chooses to engage in what clearly appears to be partisan politics. I stopped reading at page 198.