What a nice book! Summers undertook an ambitious project aimed at pulling together all of the relevant aspects of secure computing, and she has succeeded admirably. She has aimed the book at computer professionals, management, and students, and has managed to produce a book with something for all of them. I was especially impressed with her handling of any number of arcane topics, from the theoretical foundations of modern computer security to the theoretical foundations of modern cryptography.

According to the preface,

The book has four parts; Part 1 describes the societal and technological forces that affect computer security. It introduces important threats and lays a theoretical foundation. Part 2 describes technical methods: cryptography, secure design and development, protection mechanisms, operating system services and database security. Part 3 is devoted to the security of networks and distributed systems. It deals with local area networks and Internet security. Part 4 gives practical information about management of security programs, administrative controls, physical security, risk analysis and auditing.

Each part consists of several chapters, and each chapter includes a summary, a set of exercises, and an extensive set of references.

The book is not set up to be a reference work, but for the intended purpose of pulling the topic together and providing moderate depth, it does quite well. Suffice it to say that any one target audience--professionals, managers, or students--will do well to add it to their library. It does cover the field well and, as promised in the preface, no special expertise is required. I highly recommend it.