Surveillance Valley

<p><b>Yasha Levine</b> is an investigative journalist and author.<br><br>Born in Leningrad he grew up in San Francisco and now lives in New York. He has reported from all over the world. See more of his work at yashalevine.com</p> <p><b>** Featured as a <i>Guardian</i> Long Read **</b><br><br><b>'[A] fast-paced myth busting exposé' <i>Max Blumenthal author of </i><i>The Management of Savagery</i></b><br><br><b>'Contentious... forceful... salutary' <i>The New Yorker</i></b><br><br><b>EVERYTHING WE HAVE BEEN TOLD ABOUT THE DEMOCRATIC NATURE OF THE INTERNET IS A MARKETING PLOY.</b><br><br>As the Cambridge Analytica scandal has shown private corporations consider it their right to use our data (and by extension us) which ever way they see fit. Tempted by their appealing organisational and diagnostic tools we have allowed private internet corporations access to the most intimate corners of our lives.<br><br><b>But the internet was developed from the outset as a weapon.</b><br><br>Looking at the hidden origins of many internet corporations and platforms Levine shows that this is a function not a bug of the online experience. <br><br>Conceived as a surveillance tool by ARPA to control insurgents in the Vietnam War the internet is now essential to our lives. This book investigates the troubling and unavoidable truth of its history and the unfathomable power of the corporations who now more or less own it.<br><br>Without this book your picture of contemporary society will be missing an essential piece of the puzzle.<br><br><b>'A masterful job of research and reporting about the military origins of the 'world wide web' and how its essential nature has not changed in the years since its creation during the Cold War.' - Tim Shorrock author of <i>Spies For Hire</i></b></p> An explosive revisionist history of the dark past and darker present of the internet. Contentious... forceful... salutary <i>'Surveillance Valley</i> is perhaps one of the most deeply disturbing books of the year. It leaves no illusions intact ...' Gripping and hugely readable <i>Surveillance Valley</i> is an essential book which painstakingly pieces together the complex origins and current role of a technology that has become so ingrained in our lives