About the Author

Thomas Rid is Reader in War Studies at King's College London. He is also a non-resident fellow at the Center for Transatlantic Relations in the School for Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, Washington, DC.

Reviews

In Cyber War Will Not Take Place, Thomas Rid throws a well-timed bucket of cold water on an increasingly alarmist debate. Just as strategic bombing never fulfilled its promise, and even air power at its apogee -- Kosovo in 1999, or Libya two years ago -- only worked with old-fashioned boots on the ground, Rid argues that the promise of cyber war is equally illusory... What Rid does, with great skill, is to pivot the discussion away from cyber war and towards cyber weapons.' -Financial Times; 'Thomas Rid is one of Britain's leading authorities on, and sceptics about, cyber-warfare. His provocatively titled book attacks the hype and mystique about sabotage, espionage, subversion and other mischief on the internet. Rid agrees that these present urgent security problems but he dislikes talk of "warfare" and the militarisation of the debate about dangers in cyberspace. Computer code can do lots of things, but it is not a weapon of war.' - The Economist; 'This book will be welcomed by all those who have struggled to get the measure of the cyber-war threat. As Thomas Rid takes on the digital doomsters he also provides a comprehensive, authoritative and sophisticated analysis of the strategic quandaries created by the new technologies.' -Sir Lawrence Freedman, Professor of War Studies, King's College London