For Cybersecurity Awareness Month 2025, Kubnal Bridge is taking a different approach: instead of conference coverage, this piece focuses on book recommendations and journalist recommendations for B2B tech marketers and communicators.
A Quick Nod to the Cybersecurity Trends
- Generative AI remains central to cybersecurity debates, with the question of whether defenders or attackers are pulling ahead still unresolved
- Forrester projects that cyber and AI investments will fuel double-digit enterprise software growth through 2029
- Houlihan Lokey forecasts more large-scale strategic deals amid tighter VC funding
- Notable headlines include North Korean IT worker fraud, vendor platform consolidation, and increasing ransomware incidents
Four Books to Read This Cybersecurity Awareness Month
1. Dark Wire: The Incredible True Story of the Largest Sting Operation Ever by Joseph Cox
Joseph Cox spent years reporting on Anom, the FBI's covert app that criminals believed was secure. Dark Wire provides a definitive account of how law enforcement secretly built a global wiretap into the criminal underworld. It functions as both a true-crime thriller and a cautionary tale about surveillance and privacy. Kubnal Bridge previously hosted Joseph for a fireside chat discussing how new media models are reshaping cyber journalism.
2. Number Go Up: Inside Crypto's Wild Rise and Staggering Fall by Zeke Faux
Zeke Faux followed crypto's mainstream rise and spectacular collapse, from luxury yachts to human trafficking rings in Southeast Asia, ultimately chronicling Sam Bankman-Fried's fall and a $3 trillion bubble. This book captures how quickly narratives can rise, dominate headlines, and unravel — a reminder to look past buzzwords and understand what's actually happening underneath.
3. Click Here to Kill Everybody: Security and Survival in a Hyper-connected World by Bruce Schneier
Bruce Schneier unpacks vulnerabilities of hyper-connected systems in accessible language, explaining concepts from car crashes to pacemaker tampering. Schneier possesses a rare ability for making the complex accessible without losing depth — a masterclass in simplicity and clarity for communicating cyber risks to broader audiences.
4. A Hacker's Mind: How the Powerful Bend Society's Rules, and How to Bend Them Back by Bruce Schneier
Schneier expands the hacking concept beyond code to financial, legal, political, cognitive, and AI systems. The book reframes hacking as a worldview: spotting loopholes, anticipating how people bend rules, and recognizing unintended consequences.
Cybersecurity Reporters to Follow
Sam Sabin, Axios
Sam Sabin authors the Future of Cybersecurity newsletter and brings a sharp lens to the industry. Her ability to balance panels, scoops, and analysis makes her one of the most reliable voices on industry direction. She moderates panels at major conferences and participates in media discussions with PR professionals.
Zack Whittaker, TechCrunch
Zack Whittaker writes ~this week in security~, a free weekly newsletter providing clean, curated digestion of important developments with sufficient depth for understanding significance. The newsletter maintains comprehensiveness without overwhelming readers.
David Jones, Cybersecurity Dive
David Jones is characterized as someone consistently on top of developments. He delivers fast, high-quality coverage at the intersection of cybersecurity policy, enterprise risk, and the cybercrime economy, covering breaches, zero-days, ransomware, threat groups, and business impact.
Final Takeaways
Cybersecurity Awareness Month offers opportunity to reflect on threats, innovations, and stories shaping the industry. The advice: pick up a book and follow a reporter. Long-form reading sharpens dot-connecting ability, while following top journalists keeps practitioners grounded in real-time shifts that matter.