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Bombs and Bandwidth: The Emerging Relationship Between Information Technology and Security

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At first glance, it is easy to mistake this work for yet another in the Cyberterror genre: "The Internet: Be Afraid!" More specifically, it is easily mistaken for an example of the subgenre Security Fears: "You have no security. Terrorists with computers are everywhere! Get over it--or give us more power..." Both the title and the subtitle suggest that the work will largely be about the Internet and state conflict, or the cybernetic "military revolution." Happily, this is not the case. In fact, the calm and rational voices of experts such as those who have contributed to Bombs and Bandwidth is the best remedy we have for such anxieties.

The work is a project coordinated by the Social Science Research Council. This might lead readers of a certain inclination in turn to think of the authors of the thirteen chapters as predominantly egg-headed liberals. Readers with such presuppositions should begin reading Professor Carolyn Nordstrom's chapter, in which she treks along African smuggling routes despite hardships and dangers appropriate to Soldier of Fortune magazine. Such readers, however, might be somewhat disappointed, because the villains she meets are often highly educated and quite capable of fixing their computers, satellite telephones and assorted ICT (Information-Communications Technology) appliances as skillfully as they wield them in bringing their illicit goods onto the world market.

For those wanting a broad survey, which at the same time consists of carefully written and organized studies of relatively narrow topics, this is the book. The work would also be a very useful text in a college or university classroom in any topic area touching upon digitalization or political conflict. With careful reading, it could serve as both an introduction, and as an in depth-analysis of important aspects of a wide variety of related fields.

For a full review see Interface Volume 9 Issue 2.

Information technology has become central to how governments, terrorists and social movements organize and conduct themselves, changing traditional concepts of privacy, surveillance, and security. In Bombs And Bandwidth: The Emerging Relationship Between Information Technology And Security, Robert Latham gathers and edits essays which stem from a project of the Social Science Research Council, assembling leading scholars across disciplines to explore the new IT-related environment and its threats. A fine examination.