// Prerequisites
What to read before A Hacker's Mind
If A Hacker's Mind feels too steep at beginner level, here is what to read first. Lighter books in the same topics that build the prerequisites this one assumes.
01 · 2020
The Hacker and the State
Ben Buchanan's argument that state-on-state cyber operations are not deterrence-shaped (like nuclear) but signaling-shaped: countries use cyber to shape the environment, not to threaten escalation. Builds the case from declassified incidents.
Beginner5/5Ben Buchanan02 · 2018
The Perfect Weapon
The NYT national security correspondent's account of how cyber weapons became the tool states reach for short of war, from Stuxnet to Russian election interference. Strong on the politics and decision-making, light on the technology.
Beginner4/5David E. Sanger03 · 2021
Cyberjutsu
Ben McCarty maps declassified medieval ninja scrolls onto modern adversary tradecraft. More analogy-driven than technical, useful for security-program framing.
Beginner3/5Ben McCarty04 · 2015
La cybersécurité
A pocket-sized primer on cybersecurity as a societal and geopolitical issue — threats, actors, stakes and policy — in the classic French “Que sais-je ?” format.
Beginner3/5Nicolas Arpagian05 · 2017
American Kingpin
A propulsive account of how Ross Ulbricht built the Silk Road dark-web drug empire as Dread Pirate Roberts, and how a handful of investigators across rival agencies finally unmasked him.
Beginner5/5Nick Bilton06 · 2011
Kingpin
Kevin Poulsen's reconstruction of Max Butler's career — from white-hat consultant to running CardersMarket, the carding forum that consolidated the early-2000s underground — and the FBI investigation that finally took him down.
Beginner5/5Kevin Poulsen07 · 2019
Sandworm
Long-form journalism on the GRU's hacking operations, the best non-technical book on what state-level cyber actually looks like.
Beginner5/5Andy Greenberg08 · 1999
The Code Book
A narrative history of cryptography from Caesar ciphers to public-key, told through the people and the wars that turned on broken codes. Still the best on-ramp to why crypto matters.
Beginner5/5Simon Singh