It may sound trite, but when The Economist this week talked about the end of the internal combustion engine this week, and we hear stories about ransomware, the hacking of Game of Thrones, or cyberwarfare, we truly are experiencing the dawn of a new age. That new age is driven by the virtual world and it involves hackers, bots, cyber warriors and cyber terrorists – and it may evolve into something even more dystopian.

This is a difficult age to understand and there are few materials around to help us do that. This is where Daniel Wagner's new book Virtual Terror comes in. It is a comprehensive but digestible volume on cyber warfare in all its forms. Daniel, who joined me for Episodes 10 and 17, comes back on the show to tell us about "virtual terror".

We discuss:

• Virtual terrorism and how it differs from conventional terrorism;
• The landscape and players;
• The internet of things (IoT), smart items and vulnerabilities these can create;
• The "Dark Web";
• The private sector, government and other responses;
• Social media;
• Strategies to manage these uncertainties;
• Artificial Intelligence and the future
• Much more

Show notes:

• Virtual Terror (USA)
• Virtual Terror (UK)
• Daniel on Twitter: https://twitter.com/countryriskmgmt
• Daniel's company, Country Risk Solutions: http://countryrisksolutions.com/
• http://riskcooperative.com/
• "American Peril" – Dan Carlin's Hardcore History

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