The Oracle - Hardcover

by Ari Juels (Author)

Fears of a weaponized blockchain become reality when a software developer races to deactivate the rogue smart contract targeting him for assassination.

Life is comfortable for a prominent, if schlubby, developer at a New York City blockchain company. That is, until FBI Special Agent Diane Dum駭il seeks his help against a bewildering threat: The Delphians, worshippers of the god Apollo, have launched a rogue program on a blockchain. It's offering a crypto bounty to assassinate a European archaeology professor.

The developer brushes off the danger until he learns the next target: Himself.

Mythical antiquity collides with a near-future cyberworld as The Oracle's unassuming hero and his FBI partner race against time to dismantle the Delphians' murderous blockchain software. Theirs is a whirlwind tale of oracles ancient and modern, vanished antiquities and conjured crypto billions, cybercriminals and digital idealists--narrated by a cynical hero normally more concerned with dark chocolate than the consequences of the technologies he's pioneering. What happens when the crypto ideals of privacy and truth might cost human lives--especially your own?

Author Biography

Dr. Ari Juels is a professor at Cornell Tech in New York City and at Cornell University, and codirector of the Initiative for CryptoCurrencies and Contracts (IC3). A renowned expert on blockchains and smart contracts, he also serves as Chief Scientist at Chainlink Labs, developer of today's most widely used blockchain oracles.