Zero Day
Ratings2
Average rating4
15
Ratings2
Average rating4
An airliner's controls abruptly fail mid-flight over the Atlantic. An oil tanker runs aground in Japan when its navigational system suddenly stops dead. Hospitals everywhere have to abandon their computer databases when patients die after being administered incorrect dosages of their medicine. In the Midwest, a nuclear power plant nearly becomes the next Chernobyl when its cooling systems malfunction. At first, these random computer failures seem like unrelated events. But Jeff Aiken, a former government analyst who quit in disgust after witnessing the gross errors that led up to 9/11, thinks otherwise. Jeff fears a more serious attack targeting the United States computer infrastructure is already under way. And as other menacing computer malfunctions pop up around the world, some with deadly results, he realizes that there isn't much time if he hopes to prevent an international catastrophe. Written by a global authority on cyber security, Zero Day presents a chilling "what if" scenario that, in a world completely reliant on technology, is more than possible today---it's a cataclysmic disaster just waiting to happen.
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This book revolves around an Arab terrorist plot to use computer viruses to bring down the US and European powers. The story is a fairly by-the-numbers thriller which stands out primarily for the fact that its author is a renowned computer expert. Not much of his expertise really comes out in the story, however. That is probably because he was consciously trying to hold back for fear of boring non-computer-literate readers. My guess is that he should have gone for it and made a book that at least stood out for its in-depth explanation of the inner-workings of our cyber-culture. This is clearly a first effort and maybe we'll see something more interesting if he attempts a second book.
