“A chilling depiction of a not-so-distant future.”—Vice-Motherboard

Peter Warren Singer is Strategist at New America. He has been named by the Smithsonian as one of the nation’s 100 leading innovators, by Defense News as one of the 100 most influential people in defense issues, by Foreign Policy to their Top 100 Global Thinkers List, and as an official “Mad Scientist” for the U.S. Army’s Training and Doctrine Command. Peter’s award winning books include Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military IndustryChildren at WarWired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century; and Cybersecurity and Cyberwar: What Everyone Needs to Know and Ghost Fleet: A Novel of the Next World War, a technothriller crossed with nonfiction research, which has been endorsed by people who range from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs to the co-inventor of the Internet to the writer of HBO Game of Thrones. His latest book is LikeWar (Oct 2018, HMH), which explores how social media has changed war and politics, and war and politics has changed social media. It was named an Amazon book of the year, a NY Times “new and notable,” and reviewed by Booklist as “LikeWar should be required reading for everyone living in a democracy and all who aspire to.”

His past work include serving at the Office of the Secretary of Defense, Harvard University, an editor at Popular Science magazine, and as the founding director of the Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence at Brookings, where he was the youngest person named senior fellow in its 100 year history.

PW's Featured Titles

Burn-In

Mariner Books |
Novel

An FBI agent hunts a new kind of terrorist through a Washington, DC, of the future in this groundbreaking book – at once a gripping technothriller and a fact-based tour of tomorrow

America is on the brink of a revolution, one both technological and political. The science fiction of AI and robotics has finally come true, but millions are angry and fearful that the future has left them behind.

After narrowly stopping a bombing at Washington’s Union Station, FBI Special Agent Lara Keegan receives a new assignment: to field-test an advanced police robot. As a series of shocking catastrophes unfolds, the two find themselves investigating a conspiracy whose mastermind is using cutting-edge tech to rip the nation apart. To stop this new breed of terrorist, their only hope is to forge a new type of partnership.

Burn-In is especially chilling because it is something more than a pulse-pounding read: every tech, trend, and scene is drawn from real world research on the ways that our politics, our economy, and even our family lives will soon be transformed. Blending a techno-thriller’s excitement with nonfiction’s insight, Singer and Cole illuminate the darkest corners of the world soon to come.

LikeWar: The Weaponization of Social Media

Eamon Dolan/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt |
Nonfiction

Named a Best Book of the Year
By Amazon and Foreign Affairs Magazine

Through the weaponization of social media, the internet is changing war and politics, just as war and politics are changing the internet. Terrorists livestream their attacks, “Twitter wars” produce real‑world casualties, and viral misinformation alters not just the result of battles, but the very fate of nations. War, tech, and politics have blurred into a new kind of battle space that plays out on our smartphones.

P. W. Singer and Emerson Brooking tackle the mind‑bending questions that arise when war goes online and the online world goes to war.

Delving into the web’s darkest corners, LikeWar outlines a radical new paradigm for understanding and defending against the unprecedented threats of our networked world.

Cybersecurity and Cyberwar: What Everyone Needs to Know

Oxford University Press |
Nonfiction

A generation ago, cyberspace was just a term from science fiction, used to describe the nascent network of computers linking a few university labs. Today, our entire modern way of life, from communication to commerce to conflict, fundamentally depends on the Internet. And the cybersecurity issues that result challenge literally everyone: politicians wrestling with everything from cybercrime to online freedom; generals protecting the nation from new forms of attack, while planning new cyberwars; business executives defending firms from once unimaginable threats, and looking to make money off of them; lawyers and ethicists building new frameworks for right and wrong. Most of all, cybersecurity issues affect us as individuals. We face new questions in everything from our rights and responsibilities as citizens of both the online and real world to simply how to protect ourselves and our families from a new type of danger. And yet, there is perhaps no issue that has grown so important, so quickly, and that touches so many, that remains so poorly understood.

 

In Cybersecurity and CyberWar: What Everyone Needs to Know(R), New York Times best-selling author P. W. Singer and noted cyber expert Allan Friedman team up to provide the kind of easy-to-read, yet deeply informative resource book that has been missing on this crucial issue of 21st century life. Written in a lively, accessible style, filled with engaging stories and illustrative anecdotes, the book is structured around the key question areas of cyberspace and its security: how it all works, why it all matters, and what can we do? Along the way, they take readers on a tour of the important (and entertaining) issues and characters of cybersecurity, from the Anonymous hacker group and the Stuxnet computer virus to the new cyber units of the Chinese and U.S. militaries. Cybersecurity and CyberWar: What Everyone Needs to Know(R) is the definitive account on the subject for us all, which comes not a moment too soon.

 

What Everyone Needs to Know(R) is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press.

Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century

Penguin Press |
Nonfiction

“[Singer’s] enthusiasm becomes infectious . . . Wired for War is a book of its time: this is strategy for the Facebook generation.” —Foreign Affairs

“An engrossing picture of a new class of weapon that may revolutionize future wars. . .” —Kirkus Reviews

P. W. Singer explores the great­est revolution in military affairs since the atom bomb: the dawn of robotic warfare

We are on the cusp of a massive shift in military technology that threatens to make real the stuff of I, Robot and The Terminator. Blending historical evidence with interviews of an amaz­ing cast of characters, Singer shows how technology is changing not just how wars are fought, but also the politics, economics, laws, and the ethics that surround war itself. Travelling from the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan to modern-day “skunk works” in the midst of suburbia, Wired for War will tantalise a wide readership, from military buffs to policy wonks to gearheads.

Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry

Cornell University Press |
Nonfiction

Some have claimed that’War is too important to be left to the generals, ‘but P. W. Singer asks’What about the business executives?’Breaking out of the guns-for-hire mold of traditional mercenaries, corporations now sell skills and services that until recently only state militaries possessed. Their products range from trained commando teams to strategic advice from generals.

This new’Privatized Military Industry’encompasses hundreds of companies, thousands of employees, and billions of dollars in revenue. Whether as proxies or suppliers, such firms have participated in wars in Africa, Asia, the Balkans, and Latin America. More recently, they have become a key element in U.S. military operations. Private corporations working for profit now sway the course of national and international conflict, but the consequences have been little explored.

In this book, Singer provides the first account of the military services industry and its broader implications. Corporate Warriors includes a description of how the business works, as well as portraits of each of the basic types of companies: military providers that offer troops for tactical operations; military consultants that supply expert advice and training; and military support companies that sell logistics, intelligence, and engineering.

The privatization of warfare allows startling new capabilities and efficiencies in the ways that war is carried out. At the same time, however, Singer finds that the entrance of the profit motive onto the battlefield raises a series of troubling questions’for democracy, for ethics, for management, for human rights, and for national security.

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How to Use The Power of a Story Well Told

How do we better share new ideas and influence target audiences? How do we better understand and prepare for the future? How do we comprehend new trends and technologies? One answer may be to enlist the power of the oldest communication technology of all –story. Described in the Wall Street Journal as “the premier futurist in the national-security environment,” P.W. Singer is a best-selling author of both nonfiction and fiction, whose work at the intersection of strategic foresight, discovery, and narrative has been featured in media like The Economist and Wired. He is also the founder of Useful Fiction LLC, a company that aids organizations in “telling their story” more effectively. Having worked for groups that range from the US military and CIA to Hollywood and the most popular video game in history, he will explain the “why” of narrative and “how” best to tell a useful story.

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LikeWar: How Social Media has become weaponized, and what we need to know about it

Terrorists livestream their attacks, Presidents win elections over social media, and viral misinformation alters not just the result of battles, but share prices, public health, and even the very fate of nations. The result is that the Internet has blurred into a new kind of battlespace that plays out on our smartphones. P. W. Singer is the co-author of “LikeWar,” a book that was named an Amazon book of the year and has been lauded by figures as diverse as the creator of the Internet, the director of the CIA, and the producer of The Purge movies. For five years, he researched how social media works and what was its effect on the world, crossing examples that ranged from how ISIS copies the Instagram tactics of Taylor Swift, a former World of Warcraft addict foils war crimes thousands of miles away, internet trolls shape elections, and China uses a smartphone app to police the thoughts of 1.4 billion citizens. Described in the Wall Street Journal as “the premier futurist in the national-security environment,” Singer uses an exciting and entertaining speaking style to explain how and why things go viral, the new rules of power in the age of social media, and exactly what can we all do to navigate our way through a world increasingly shaped by “likes” and lies.

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The CyberThreatscape: What are the Key Trends in Cybersecurity

From ransomware to the collapse of cyber deterrence, a series of new threats are changing the cybersecurity landscape. A best selling author described by the Wall Street Journal as “one of Washington’s pre-eminent futurists,” and a consultant for groups that range from the CIA and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs to Hollywood, Singer uses an exciting speaking style to explore for an audience the key trends emerging today that will shape the world of cybersecurity tomorrow.

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NextTech: The Future of Technology, Security, and Threats

Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, The Internet of Things, Social Media, and a new geopolitical competition; the 21st century is being shaped by a range of exciting, and scary, new trends and technologies. Described in the Wall Street Journal as “the premier futurist in the national-security environment,” and a consultant for groups that range from the CIA and US military to Hollywood and the Call of Duty video game series, Singer will explore the key trends emerging today that will shape the world of technology and security tomorrow.

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Burn-In: The World of AI and Robots Turns Real

Robots, Artificial Intelligence, an Internet of Things. The next decade will see a range of exciting new technologies that all seem drawn from Science Fiction become our reality. They will drive a new industrial revolution, but also create political, economic, and security trends that will remake our world, challenging us like never before. P.W. Singer has been described by the Wall Street Journal as “the premier futurist in the national-security environment,” an official “Mad Scientist” for the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, and consults for groups that range from the CIA and the Pentagon to Hollywood. The author of the book “Burn-In: A Novel of the REAL Robotic Revolution,” Singer uses an exciting speaking style to explore for an audience the key trends emerging today that will shape the world of tomorrow.

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Cybersecurity and Cyberwar: What Everyone Needs to Know

There is no issue more important and yet less understood today than Cybersecurity. Our entire way of life, from communication to commerce to conflict, fundamentally depends on the Internet. The cybersecurity issues that result literally challenge everyone: politicians who wrestle with issues from cybercrime to online freedom; military generals protecting the nation from new forms of attack, while planning cyberwars,: business executives defending firms from once unimaginable threats, lawyers and ethicists building new framework for right and wrong. Most of all, cybersecurity challenges us as individuals, parents, and citizens. The author of a book described by the chairman of Google as “an essential read” and by the head of NATO as “the most approachable and readable book ever written on the cyber world,” Singer takes the audience through the key issues and questions that we all need to better understand: What is happening? What does it mean? And, most importantly, what can we do?

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Imagining the Future: Ghost Fleet and Its Real World Lessons

Peter W. Singer is a best selling author and consultant for groups that range from the US military to Hollywood, whose recent book Ghost Fleet (ghostfleetbook.com) broke new ground in creating the genre of what has been called “useful fiction.” It blended the style of a technothriller with nonfiction style research, leading to a learning experience that is both “a wild book, a real page turner” (the Economist) and “a modern-day successor to tomes such as The Hunt For Red October from the late Tom Clancy” (USA Today), but also packed with lessons of the future of technology, geopolitics, and security. Described by the Wall Street Journal as “one of Washington’s pre-eminent futurists,” Singer has been invited to brief the approach and lessons of the book to groups that range from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs to Congress and CEO summits.

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Social Media Lessons from Ukraine: How to Win Your Messaging War Online

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AI and the Technologies of the Future: Their Possibilities and Perils

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What are the Cyber Risks and Lessons of Social Media for Business?

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LikeWar| Peter’s Podcast

7 Episode Limited Series that “explores the ways in which technology, and especially social media, has been weaponized, arming the internet and the billions of people who use it every day.”

Links and Resources

Peter’s Recent Work

Honors, Awards & Recognition

Non-Fiction Book of the Year by the Financial Times
Top Five Book of the Year in International Affairs by the Gelber Prize
Kennedy Memorial Book of the Year Award

Media Kit

By clicking the link below you will be directed to a Google Docs Folder
where you can download author photos and cover images.

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