If everyone in our family / group / society / country was both trusting and trustworthy, we would never know to recognise the first non-trustworthy person to come along. Alternately, if too many people were untrustworthy, very little would get done, and the world would quickly run out of steel-reinforced doors. But how much is the right level of trust?…
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Review: Bruce Schneier’s “Liars and Outliers”
Sometimes it takes an expert from the wrong discipline to expose the hidden truths that guide our faith in one-another; our desire to do the right thing and why it is that some people break all the rules.
Trust is a tenuous concept. More, it is something of a ‘Goldilocks Phenomenon’ in that too much is just about as bad as too little.
Book Review: Liars and Outliers by Bruce Schneier
I recently read Bruce Schneier’s latest book – Liars and Outliers: Enabling the Trust that Society Needs to Thrive.
It’s a good book, of potential interest not just to technology people, but also to anyone wishing to understand more about the way the world works. Schneier uses a wealth of examples to demonstrate that without implicit trust towards pretty much everyone around us, society falls apart.
Reading this book convinced me once more that calls for more surveillance and a more extensive police state must be resisted. The underlying assumption (that crime can be brought down to 0% if only we give up most of our liberties) is a false one. Schneier convincingly argues that the cost of wiping out crime is too high for society – we should therefore stop the hysteria about “total security” and get on with our lives…
Bruce Schneier’s Latest Book
It’s Liars and Outliers, and I would rate it the best economics book of the year thus far. He writes about his book here and here.
Schneier views our lives from the perspective of game theory. Every day, we must decide whether to cooperate or to defect. Do I try to arrive at work on time, or do I show up late? Do I drive safely or aggressively? Do I support the goals of my department, or do I work for myself? Does my department support the goals of the larger organization, or does it pursue its own interests? Does the larger organization work to support the goals of the society to which it belongs, or does it pursue its own goals?…
Liars and Outliers: Thoughts and Conclusions
In a previous post, we looked at the first half of Bruce Schneier’s interesting book. To recap, Liars and Outliers examines how trust mechanisms work, whether you’re ordering products online from people you’ve never met, or you’re paying a neighborhood kid to mow your lawn. In order for commerce to function, there must be a certain level of trust.
The second half of the book deals with Organizations, Corporations and Institutions and how their competing interests work out in real world situations. A model often used in the book is that of fishing. Overfishing will deplete the stock and eventually ruin the industry, so most individuals and companies don’t engage in it. However, ‘defectors’ may overfish because of the short term benefits and the low risk of getting caught…
RSA 2012: Are Software Liability Laws Needed?
Software liability laws are needed to hold software companies accountable for making faulty products, argued Bruce Schneier, chief technology security officer with BT during a pro-con debate held Wednesday at the RSA Conference.
Schneier said that liability laws would transfer the economic cost for faulty software from the user to the developer and provide an incentive for the developer to fix the problem.
He compared the situation of the software market to the early days of the automobile industry when Congress passed laws that held auto manufacturers responsible for faulty vehicles that caused accidents. This prompted the auto industry to begin fixing the problems, such as stop using wooden wheels that would fall apart at high speeds…
RSA 2012: Schneier Reveals Three Biggest Information Security Risks in 2012
In his session at the RSA Conference in San Francisco, February 28th 2012, Bruce Schneier listed what he perceives to be the three biggest risks to information security right now: The rise of big data; ill-conceived law enforcement regulations; and the cyberwar arms race.
The rise of big data
The rise of big data, Schneier declared, is inevitable due to the cost of saving data being so cheap. “It’s easy and cheaper to search than sort,” he said. “The collection of data is being aggravated – mainly so the companies doing it can make more money… Companies like Apple, Amazon and Google are all competing to be the company that monetises your data.”…
RSA 2012: Schneier on Why Anonymous Is Not a Group and Why They're Certainly Not As Good As You Think They Are
At the RSA Conference 2012 in San Francisco, February 29, Bruce Schneier and Davi Ottenheimer discuss Schneier’s latest book and how to enable the trust that society needs to thrive.
Following on from Schneier’s talk yesterday on the three biggest risks to information security in 2012, this discussion focussed purely on the topic of Schneier’s latest book, Liars and Outliers.
Here are some of the session highlights:
- Security depends on people. “I started in cryptography because I didn’t like people. I wanted to study numbers. Anyone in security needs to understand that people act in unpredictable ways.”…
Government, Business, Military are Internet Security Threats
RSA 2012 Usually the bête noire of the annual RSA conference is the criminal hacking community, but security guru Bruce Schneier asserts that government, business, and the military may well pose a bigger threat to security professionals.
“The current risks to internet freedom, openness, and innovation don’t come from the bad guys—they are political and technical. I suppose I should call this talk ‘Layer eight and nine threats’,” he told his audience on Tuesday at RSA 2012.
Attempts at ill-conceived legislation are a major concern, he said. Outsiders trying to legislate something they have no understanding of (a “…
RSA 2012: Three Greatest (And Suprising) Internet Security Dangers
Cybercriminals are not the greatest threat to Internet security. It’s the many forces trying to bend the world’s computer network to fit their interests.
That’s according to Bruce Schneier, a renowned security technologist and author of several books, including “Applied Cryptography.” Schneier told attendees Tuesday at the RSA Conference that the three greatest dangers are Big Data companies, poorly thought out government regulations, and the cyberwar arms race.
These threats foster instability through those lobbying for changes that further their self-interests, instead of what’s better universally, Schneier said. “The security community doesn’t have a lobby, common sense doesn’t have a lobby and technical excellence doesn’t have a lobby.”…
Trust and the Development of Institutions: Reviewing Liars & Outliers
I managed to snag an early copy of Bruce Schneier’s new book, Liars & Outliers: Enabling the Trust that Society Needs to Thrive. It’s a bit different from the books you normally see reviewed on development blogs. I’m a fan of Schneier’s sensible commentary on security issues, so I thought his book might provide some insights relevant to development work. I read it with general questions about institutional development—and specifically the issue of corruption—in mind.
A theory of coercion, compliance and trust
Schneier’s book provides a framework for understanding trust, compliance, cooperation, defection, coercion, and security across a variety of contexts. He starts by noting that trust is essential for our daily lives: we have to trust that merchants won’t cheat us, that other commuters will drive safely, and that the money we put in our bank account will be safe. Our economic and political systems wouldn’t function without trust. And we, in turn, can only trust others if society finds ways to promote cooperation…
Sidebar photo of Bruce Schneier by Joe MacInnis.