The ubiquitous password is the usually accepted standard for identity in the digital era-this book traces its history, development, and potential futures.

An erudite and interesting amble through the history, philosophy, and psychology of passwords. Bruce Schneier, Security Technologist and New York Times-Bestselling Author of Data and Goliath The Hidden Battles to Collect Your Data and Control Your World Conjuring our passwords has become a daily act of our computer-saturated existence. By no means sequestered to our digital present, Martin Paul Eve's excellent account of the password covers its long and lively history. Weaving literary references with lucid technical explanations, Eve skillfully traces the evolution of password to probe its fundamental connections to issues of human identity, trust, and ownership. Gabriella Coleman, Wolfe Chair in Scientific and Technological Literacy, McGill University, Canada

Martin Paul Eve is Professor of Literature, Technology and Publishing at Birkbeck College, University of London, UK. He is the author of Open Access and the Humanities: Contexts, Controversies and the Future (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014) and Pynchon and Philosophy: Wittgenstein, Foucault and Adorno (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014).

1. Introduction 2. "Who goes there?": Military, Mortality and Passwords 3. Special Characters: Passwords in Literature and Film 4. P455w0rd5 and the Digital Era 5. Identity List of Illustrations Notes Index