Cryptology is the practice of hiding digital information by means of various obfuscatory and steganographic techniques. The application of said techniques facilitates message confidentiality and sender/receiver identity authentication, and helps to ensure the integrity and security of computer passwords, ATM card information, digital signatures, DVD and HDDVD content, and electronic commerce. Cryptography is also central to digital rights management (DRM), a group of techniques for technologically controlling the use of copyrighted material that is being widely implemented and deployed at the behest of corporations that own and create revenue from the hundreds of thousands of mini-transactions that take place daily on programs like iTunes.
This new edition of our best-selling book on cryptography and information hiding delineates a number of different methods to hide information in all types of digital media files. These methods include encryption, compression, data embedding and watermarking, data mimicry, and scrambling. During the last 5 years, the continued advancement and exponential increase of computer processing power have enhanced the efficacy and scope of electronic espionage and content appropriation. Therefore, this edition has amended and expanded outdated sections in accordance with new dangers, and includes 5 completely new chapters that introduce newer more sophisticated and refined cryptographic algorithms and techniques (such as fingerprinting, synchronization, and quantization) capable of withstanding the evolved forms of attack.
Each chapter is divided into sections, first providing an introduction and high-level summary for those who wish to understand theconcepts without wading through technical explanations, and then presenting concrete examples and greater detail for those who want to write their own programs. This combination of practicality and theory allows programmers and system designers to not only implement tried and true encryption procedures, but also consider probable future developments in their designs, thus fulfilling the need for preemptive caution that is becoming ever more explicit as the transference of digital media escalates.
* Includes 5 completely new chapters that delineate the most current and sophisticated cryptographic algorithms, allowing readers to protect their information against even the most evolved electronic attacks.
* Conceptual tutelage in conjunction with detailed mathematical directives allows the reader to not only understand encryption procedures, but also to write programs which anticipate future security developments in their design.
* Grants the reader access to online source code which can be used to directly implement proven cryptographic procedures such as data mimicry and reversible grammar generation into their own work.

What would you rather have to take the SAT: a) a brain b) a pencil c) some scratch paper d) all of the above and a dictionary and a math helper? Read this new short book exploring how some computer geniuses are helping kids with money choose (d). They're sneaking in help to ace the exam. Journalist Peter Wayner interviewed a number of computer hackers and explored how they're helping thousands of kids slip a bit of extra help into the exam. He tried their techniques and found that they could boost scores by fifty to two hundred points. The scariest revelation he discovered is that the College Board doesn't seem to care enough to stop it. Read his short book exploring these rings of hackers and learn just how easy it can be to get a bit of extra help.

In life, time is money, and on the Internet, the size of data is money. Small programs and small files take less disk space and cost less to send over the Internet. Compression Algorithms for Real Programmers describes the basic algorithms and approaches for compressing information so you can create the smallest files possible. These new algorithms are making it possible for people to take impossibly large audio and video files and compress them enough that they can flow over the Internet.
* Examines the classic algorithms like Huffman coding, arithmetic compression, and dictionary-based schemes in depth
* Describes the basic approaches used to squeeze audio and video signals by factors of as much as 100: 1
* Discusses the philosophy of compression to illustrate the underlying trade-offs in the algorithms
* Explores the use of wavelets and other modeling techniques that use repetitive functions to squeeze audio and video
* Shows how programming solutions like Adobe PostScript can save space and make networks more efficient
* Describes new approaches using fractals and grammars just being explored by the compression community
* Shows how to extend the algorithms and use them for copyright protection