Michael J. Weber's career began on Madison Avenue where he produced hundreds of TV commercials, including several award winners, for top sponsors and ad agencies. He eventually landed in Hollywood and started writing screenplays.

"Invasion of Privacy" is the second book written by Michael J. Weber in three years. His first, "Confessions of an Internet Auction Junkie", was published by Prima/Random House in October 2000. Weber emphasizes his middle initial -- J -- to avoid confusion. Another author named Michael Weber writes books about the Civil War.

Weber was introduced to computing in 1979. A couple of years later he began budgeting TV commercials on the first IBM PC and an Apple 2. Weber has been a computer fanatic ever since!

Since your background is not that of a typical computer geek I'm really curious about how you got interested in computer security and online privacy.


Outrage sparked my interest. My last book, "Confessions of an Internet Auction Junkie", was released during the last gasp of the tech boom. People were quitting their jobs to earn a better living on eBay. Investors were getting rich on tech stocks. Inventors were launching IPO's from their garages. The Internet was fresh and held so much promise. Spam, viruses, worms, pop-ups ads, were hardly a problem. I'm not talking about ancient history. That was only three years ago!

As my new book explains, there's a direct corollary between Moore's Law and the decline in personal privacy. On a bell curve our privacy has decreased at about the same rate the power of the CPU increased. When the tech boom fizzled technology turned malignant! I decided to investigate why and that's how I came to write "Invasion of Privacy". I didn't have the answer but I knew who did; hackers and security experts. That's how the idea germinated and why I became interested in computer security and privacy.

How long did it take you to write "Invasion of Privacy" and what was it like? Any major difficulties?