Countdown to Zero Day

Stuxnet and the Launch of the World's First Digital Weapon

By: Kim Zetter

Narrated by: Joe Ochman

Length: 13 hrs

Publisher's summary

A top cybersecurity journalist tells the story behind the virus that sabotaged Iran’s nuclear efforts and shows how its existence has ushered in a new age of warfare—one in which a digital attack can have the same destructive capability as a megaton bomb.

“Immensely enjoyable . . . Zetter turns a complicated and technical cyber story into an engrossing whodunit.”—The Washington Post

The virus now known as Stuxnet was unlike any other piece of malware built before: Rather than simply hijacking targeted computers or stealing information from them, it proved that a piece of code could escape the digital realm and wreak actual, physical destruction—in this case, on an Iranian nuclear facility.

In these chapters, journalist Kim Zetter tells the whole story behind the world’s first cyberweapon, covering its genesis in the corridors of the White House and its effects in Iran—and telling the spectacular, unlikely tale of the security geeks who managed to unravel a top secret sabotage campaign years in the making.

But Countdown to Zero Day also ranges beyond Stuxnet itself, exploring the history of cyberwarfare and its future, showing us what might happen should our infrastructure be targeted by a Stuxnet-style attack, and ultimately, providing a portrait of a world at the edge of a new kind of war.

©2014 Kim Zetter (P)2014 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“An authoritative account of Stuxnet’s spread and discovery . . . [delivers] a sobering message about the vulnerability of the systems—train lines, water-treatment plants, electricity grids—that make modern life possible.”—Economist

“Exhaustively researched . . . Zetter gives a full account of this ‘hack of the century,’ as the operation has been called, [but] the book goes well beyond its ostensible subject to offer a hair-raising introduction to the age of cyber warfare.”—The Wall Street Journal

“Part detective story, part scary-brilliant treatise on the future of warfare . . . an ambitious, comprehensive, and engrossing book that should be required reading for anyone who cares about the threats that America—and the world—are sure to be facing over the coming years.”—Kevin Mitnick, New York Times bestselling author of Ghost in the Wires and The Art of Intrusion

Want to know about Stuxnet this is the book.

excellent book, very detailed, as such it was a little difficult to listen to at times. bit definitely worth the listen and read..

Cyber Scarry!!! You will want to unplug after....

Would you listen to Countdown to Zero Day again? Why?

The amount of detail ensures that each read will uncover something that you will have missed previously, but one pass is enough to give you the sense of the danger to online systems.

What did you like best about this story?

The technical details were great, but did not sound like reading of a Comp Sci text book.

Eye Opening

This book provides an excellent account of how exactly Stuxnet actually works in an understandable way. Once you start to wrap your head around how the payload actually affected its target, it is shocking at how simple and effective the techniques employed are. It makes you wonder that if these systems were vulnerable and successfully exploited, what other industrial control systems are equally/more exploitable? It really makes you start to think about all kinds of computer controlled systems that we rely on as a society that are likely susceptible to a similar type of attack.

An essential for anyone in the cybersecurity field.

Title says it best but I’ll say it again: An absolute essential for anyone in, around, or near the cybersecurity field. Having a solid grasp of where we’ve come from and the capabilities therein is essential in seeing where we’re going.

Amazingly detailed, sober and above all, damning

Digital warfare generally conjures up bad science fiction imagery and seems more fanciful fiction than reality... However, that changed when Stuxnet was discovered, a carefully multiple pronged attack against Iran's secretive nuclear weapons program.

"Countdown to Zero Day" chronicles the discovery Stuxnet from its origins in Belarus, and follows the painstakingly detailed researched conduncted by a truly international cast, from Symantec researchers in the United States, Kaspersky Labs in Russia and security firms in India.

Kim Zetter carefully introduces the mystery of who wrote the Stuxnet virus and takes plenty of intermissions to explain the instability and insecurity of industrial control systems, and the very real threats they yield, as told by real world incidents, controlled tests and government experts assessment.

The book is measured, and isn't written as a fear-mongering piece, advocating more security but rather how the United States rushed head first into a new domain of espionage and war without ever fully considering the ramifications. It's painfully damning George Bush Jr and Barrack Obama's administrations.

Joe Ochman is almost a non-entity, transparently blending into the content and I mean this as a positive. I barely registered him as I was lost within the content. He's exceptionally easy to listen to, and never distracting. For a book that requires mostly narration, he's a great match.

Kim Zetter is extremely versed in his technology, and painstakingly details each major reveal in the case of Stuxnet as a hodgepodge of global researchers chase the rabbit continually further down the hole.Zetter isn't afraid to critique, often using quotes between security firms and government representatives to express the problematic nature of our digital platform. Towards the end, Zetter quotes and deconstructs the mantra, NOBUS (Nobody but us) used by the NSA, as an inherently flawed and naive view of cyber-security. Essentially, the inaction of government agencies to report weaknesses, flaws and glitches to save as a goodie bag for the United States puts everyone at risk as its arrogant to assume the United States will be the only ones who can use an exploit, and the "digital missiles" can be caught, deconstructed and fired back. In digital warfare.

Having read, Mark Bowden's Worm, about Conficker, Zetter avoids pandering and cuts into the technical aspects without apology. It's sure to alienate less technical readers. Those unfamiliar with patch Tuesday and the significance of out-of-band updates from Microsoft, or even what a zero-day exploit is, may want to start with Worm as a primer.

This book isn't for everyone due to the technical nature of it. I could easily see an average reader getting lost or eyes glazing over at times. As someone who's livelihood is tied web development, and followed stuxnet in the news, this book is fascinating. I remember clearly being blown away when the MD5 collision attack was discovered as it essentially confirmed that Stuxnet was made by nation-state actors.

In the end, it's wild ride, stranger than fiction journey that involves international conspiracies, assassinations, wildly intelligent researchers across the entire globe. By the end, while you never learn who the faces are behind Stuxnet, you'll have zero doubts about which nations were behind it.

Cyber war vs Ground war.

How many more viruses does the U.S. have out there? How many times has the U.S. been hacked already? The only difference is the technical expertise of the offending party. To the average guy, if war has to be, let it be in cyber space.

Exhaustive yet compelling

Lots of detail here on the first cyber-attack but a story well told, aimed at a non- technical audience. The discovery narrative is riveting. The book thoroughly addresses strategy and policy repercussions of Stuxnet.

scare your cracker teens straight

The philosophical questions and moral issues these provoke is the real prize of this book.

A must read for computer techies.

This book provided all of the gory details about Stuxnet. Not only did it address the technical aspects, it also discussed the ramifications of the use of the first known cyber weapon.

Informative, entertaining, and frightening.

Very informative

This book certainly shed a lot of light in an area that I was unaware currently existed. I guess I knew that it existed, but I didn't realize it was so advanced.