// Comparison

Anonymat sur Internet vs La face cachée d'internet: Which Should You Read?

Two cybersecurity books on Privacy, compared honestly: who each is for, what each does best, and which to read first.

Beginner

3/52014

Protéger sa vie privée

Martin Untersinger

A practical French guide to online anonymity and privacy — proxies, VPNs, Tor, secure messaging and mobile — by a Le Monde cybersecurity journalist (later one of the Pegasus reporters).

Beginner

4/52017

La face cachée d'internet

Hackers, dark net, Tor, Anonymous, WikiLeaks, Bitcoin

Rayna Stamboliyska

A lively, expert tour of the Internet's hidden layers — hackers, the dark web, Tor, Anonymous, WikiLeaks, Bitcoin — that demystifies the jargon without dumbing it down.

Read this if

Non-experts who want concrete, post-Snowden steps to protect their privacy online, explained clearly by a journalist who covers the field.

Curious general readers who want an accurate, engaging map of hacker culture, the dark web, cryptocurrency and online anonymity, from someone who actually knows the field.

Skip this if

Security professionals wanting depth, or anyone needing 2025-current tooling; it's a 2014 guide, so specific tools and threat models have moved on.

Practitioners wanting technical depth; it's high-quality vulgarisation, not a manual. Some specifics (tools, services) have moved on since 2017.

Key takeaways

A clear, practical French primer on online anonymity for ordinary users.
Written by Untersinger (Le Monde), later a Pegasus revelations reporter — credible and grounded.
From 2014: the principles hold (Tor, VPNs, messaging), but verify specific tools against current advice.

An accurate, accessible French explainer of the topics most media get wrong — dark web, Tor, Anonymous, Bitcoin.
Stamboliyska is a genuine expert, so the demystification is correct, not sensationalist.
A great gateway for non-technical readers curious about the net's underside.

How they compare

We rate La face cachée d'internet higher (4/5 against 3/5 for Anonymat sur Internet). For most readers, that means La face cachée d'internet is the primary pick and Anonymat sur Internet is a useful follow-up.

Both books target beginner-level readers, so the choice is about topic, not difficulty.

Anonymat sur Internet and La face cachée d'internet both cover Privacy, so reading them in sequence reinforces the same material from different angles.

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Anonymat sur Internet

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