Surveillance Valley: The Secret Military History of the Internet

Yasha Levineis an investigative journalist and author.
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

"A real publicservice."—San Francisco Review of Books
"This polemical history argues that the U.S. military's role inthe development of the Internet indelibly shaped the system intoa powerful tool of government surveillance. ... amid increasing dismay abouttechnology's influence on contemporary life, such forceful questioning issalutary."—New Yorker
"Provocative history of the internet-equipped security state,implicating key players in the digital economy in the game of espionage....Levine, a tech-savvy investigative journalist, documents an army of them in hiswide-ranging look at the way governments and companies alike spy on ordinarycitizens."—Kirkus
"This engrossinginvestigation will find a large audience among those interested in the uses andabuses of technology."—Library Journal
"Yasha Levine's bold and sweeping history of the Internet-from itsshadowy inception as a military contrivance for counterinsurgency and domesticsurveillance, to its current incarnation as a commercialized tool for everydaycommunication that turns everyone's life into an open book-tells a grippingstory of our algorithmic way of life in the making. Defying common Internettropes that present a battle between valiant and independent rebels versusomnipresent state and corporate powers, no one comes out of this book lookingclean. Whatever your thoughts about our digitized world, this book willchallenge them."—Stuart Ewen, Distinguished Professor of History, Sociology and Media Studies at Hunter College and the CUNY Graduate Center
"The Internet will never be the same after you readSurveillance Valley.Yasha Levine has done a masterful job of research and reporting about themilitary origins of the 'world wide web' and how its essential nature has notchanged in the years since its creation during the Cold War. I especiallyapplaud his courage in unraveling the connections between the so-called 'deepstate' and its economic allies in Silicon Valley with the big guns of the 'privacy' movement, who have scoffed at virtually every attempt at making theiroperations transparent to the public."—Tim Shorrock, author of Spies for Hire: The Secret World of Intelligence Outsourcing
"In this fast-paced, myth busting expose, Yasha Levinedocuments how a collection of spooks, cybernetic fanatics, and libertarian oligarchs haveexploited the internet to promote regime change abroad and establish atotalistic spying network at home.Surveillance Valleyisan unprecedented journalistic achievement, revealing the untold history of theanti-democratic regime that rules our lives from behind a glossy LED screen."—Max Blumenthal, author of Goliath: Life and Loathing in Greater Israel, senior editor of AlterNet's Grayzone Project
"An important historylesson."—TANK
"SurveillanceValleyis a troubling book, but it is an important book. Itsmashes comforting myths."—Boundary 2
"Googleemployees rightfully balked recently when they found out theiremployer had a number of defense contracts; one wonders if they knew thatthe tech industry was quite literally founded on the back of the defenseindustry, such that there was a time when they were synonymous. Yasha Levine'swonderful historical tract shatters any illusion that the two industries wereever really that at odds with each other."—Salon