Title: Little Brother
Author: Cory Doctorow
Genre: Science Fiction
Not only is Little Brother the most important book I’ve read this month, it may well be the most important book I’ve read in ten years.
I have always found Cory Doctorow’s work both entertaining and thought provoking. Little Brother is all that and more. It’s a great story that shows (rather than tells) us how important our civil rights are, both online and in real life, through Marcus, a cocky, seventeen-year-old hacker who finds himself in the wrong place at the wrong time. After a traumatizing detention with the Department of Homeland Security, Marcus finds that his entire city is turned into a police state that makes his school’s intrusive security practices look like a pre-9/11 Canadian border. He turns his hacking skills toward creating an underground network intended for his peers by hacking his Xbox. His efforts to exploit weaknesses in DHS security escalate into a cyber arms race with the feds.
It’s not easy to work an explanation of the false-positive paradox, public-key cryptography, or DNS tunnelling into a work of fiction, let alone an explanation that most people could understand and not yawn halfway through. More than any other fiction genre, SF is likely to suffer from the fact that a) the science aspects require a lot of exposition, and b) it’s hard to understand the story of you don’t understand the science. Doctorow has actually managed to get around this in that you can still enjoy the story if the technical exposition doesn’t quite make sense to you.
But more importantly, this book brings up a lot of ideas that are important for kids to know and think about, especially kids who take it for granted that schools can force them to walk through metal detectors into camera-monitored classrooms; search their lockers, backpacks, and persons without a warrant; and expel them for heinous offenses such as possession of aspirin or diabetes supplies. If this is their normal environment, what will they be willing to accept when they’re out of school? We adults ought to be pondering the implications of that carefully, given that a lot of high school kids will be able to vote in the next election.
Another point that Doctorow slips in is how much we really own our tech toys. iPhones and Xboxes come with security measures to ensure that we can only load manufacturer-approved software on devices that we have not only paid for, but that we continue to pay to use. Sure there are hacks out there, and there’s always going to be a hacker who enjoys cracking those systems. But we all take it for granted that manufacturers can lock the devices down in the first place. Doctorow points out that most security doesn’t actually make us more secure. (I took this point to heart in particular. On the day I started reading Little Brother, someone used my home address and phone number to create a false email and eBay account and make a major purchase using one of my credit cards.) Hackers—and those of us who are paying attention—have always known this, and it’s often not hard to spot the weaknesses in a security setup.
Finally, the author makes is perfectly clear that the best defense is a good offense. Knowing how to program is a useful skill, but it’s more important to agitate for cyber rights and the freedom of information. He points out that we actually used to have “illegal math” (cryptography) in the U.S., and not that long ago, either.
This is a very sophisticated book for young adults, and frankly, it’s about time we started talking up to teenagers instead of down to them. Buy a copy of this book. Buy one for your kids (if you have any), and consider donating one to the school library. Even you don’t agree with anything I or the author have to say, buy it in recognition of your right to dissent. And best do it before the autoimmune disease known as national security tells our schools and bookstores to ban this book. Ben Franklin reminds us that “Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety,” and Doctorow points out that giving up essential liberty for security that doesn’t work is just plain stupid.
Hear Hear! As another victim of cyber-censorship now fighting the system over what they can do to me in the real world based on what I said online, I agree with everything you’ve said and more! Our kids need to think about the culture of censorship and “zero tolerance” they’re being indoctrinated into. I’ll be buying a copy, and giving it to Brendan when I’m done reading it myself.
I’ll be getting two copies myself. One for me and one for Ray. Thanks for the heads up Li.