Active Measures

The Secret History of Disinformation and Political Warfare

By: Thomas Rid

Narrated by: Derek Perkins

This revelatory and dramatic history of disinformation traces the rise of secret organized deception operations from the interwar period to contemporary internet troll farms

We live in the age of disinformation - of organized deception. Spy agencies pour vast resources into hacking, leaking, and forging data, often with the goal of weakening the very foundation of liberal democracy: trust in facts. Thomas Rid, a renowned expert on technology and national security, was one of the first to sound the alarm. Even before the 2016 election, he warned that Russian military intelligence was "carefully planning and timing a high-stakes political campaign" to disrupt the democratic process. But as crafty as such so-called active measures have become, they are not new.

The story of modern disinformation begins with the clash between communism and capitalism after the Russian Revolution, which would come to define the Cold War. In Active Measures, Rid reveals startling intelligence and security secrets from materials written in more than 10 languages across several nations, and from interviews with current and former operatives. He exposes the disturbing yet colorful history of professional, organized lying, revealing for the first time some of the century's most significant operations - many of them nearly beyond belief. A White Russian ploy backfires and brings down a New York police commissioner; a KGB-engineered, anti-Semitic hate campaign creeps back across the Berlin Wall; the CIA backs a fake publishing empire, run by a former Wehrmacht U-boat commander that produces Germany’s best jazz magazine. Rid tracks the rise of leaking, and shows how spies began to exploit emerging internet culture many years before WikiLeaks. Finally, he sheds new light on the 2016 election, especially the role of the infamous "troll farm" in St. Petersburg as well as a much more harmful attack that unfolded in the shadows.

Active Measures takes the listener on a guided tour deep into a vast hall of mirrors old and new, pointing to a future of engineered polarization, more active and less measured - but also offering the tools to cut through the game of deception.

A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux

©2020 Thomas Rid (P)2020 Macmillan Audio

Everyone should listen to this book

This book should be a most read for anyone who wants to understand the world

Amazing

Loved it sucks good man its cool bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad

Great insight into what’s behind the memes

Highly recommend this book!
We’re being led around by the nose. Monitoring of Merkel was an active measure. So much of what’s in the news is all out false, or massaged into appearing worse.

Incredibly interesting

I enjoyed the different perspectives and country creativity throughout the years. I also found many of these to still be thought as truth.

Enjoyable but only after it grows on you.

Very detailed account of disinformation. Almost too much detail at times, but that seems to be the norm for such material. Overall great information and substance.

Good information

Very interesting book with good information to know and the read is quick nice and fitting for the book.

Perfection

A Masterful work. Author knows his topic, and he m takes it to the 21st century.

timely

Are Asmerican politics confusing these days? Read this before you take in the rest of the noise.

History that Never Stopped. Explains so Much

With the caveat that I do not, personally, enjoy Cold War history even though I'm in this line of work, the author asks you early on, to afford him the chance to share history of Subversive Intelligence operations (i.e. "Active Measures") in order to explain today's current political landscape in Post-Trump America. I was NOT expecting to see just how relevant this historical account is to approaching what we're experiencing today. It is an investment in your time but I believe it'll be a foundational investment in how you view, react and interact with your fellow citizens. I also HIGHLY recommend Paxtons "Anatomy of Fascism" and Perlroth's "This is how they tell me the world ends". Highly Recommend if you can donate the time.

Terrifying and Fascinating!

Fantastic overview of East/West information wars for the last 100 years. Some bits of this I knew, moat I did not, even though I teach history and was born in the 70s!