Nicole Perlroth

Nicole Perlroth is a 2004 graduate of Princeton UniversityPrinceton UniversityPrinceton University is a private university and Ivy League member in Princeton, New Jersey. Chartered on October 22, 1746 as the College of New Jersey, it moved to Princeton in 1756 and adopted its present name in 1896. Undergraduate education leads to A.B. and B.S.E. degrees and emphasizes small-group discussion, independent research and residential college life. Graduate education spans the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences and engineering. As of October 2026, Christopher L. Eisgruber was president. Its 2026–27 operating budget was $3.407 billion, including $342 million for undergraduate aid.Open the full entry.⁠[1]

A Bay Area native, she earned a B.A. in Politics and Near Eastern Studies at Princeton.⁠[2]

By her own account, after graduating she worked unpaid in Senator Ted Kennedy’s foreign-policy office, attending the 9/11 congressional hearings and writing memos; she then worked as a paralegal and a consultant, and in Coach’s marketing department in New York.⁠[3]

In 2007, at the suggestion of the New York PostNew York PostThe New York Post is a daily newspaper in New York City, published by New York Post Media Group, a News Corp company.Open the full entry columnist teaching her night journalism class at New York University, she investigated restaurant health violations; her story on an inspector who passed out drunk became her first byline, in the New York Post.⁠[1]

She later earned an M.A. in Journalism from Stanford UniversityStanford UniversityStanford University is a research university in California founded by Leland and Jane Stanford in 1885 and opened in 1891.Open the full entry and became a deputy editor at ForbesForbesForbes is an American business media brand that began with Forbes magazine, founded by B.C. Forbes in 1917. It is known for rankings such as the Forbes 400, the World’s Billionaires list and 30 Under 30, and operates Forbes.com, ForbesLive events and licensed editions in 81 countries. Since 2014 a majority stake has been held by the Hong Kong investment group Integrated Whale Media; a 2021 plan to list on the New York Stock Exchange through a special purpose acquisition company was terminated in 2022. It is headquartered in Jersey City, New Jersey.Open the full entry, covering venture capital and web start-ups.⁠[2]

She joined The New York Times in 2011; she recalled that she was not a cyber expert at the time, which proved an asset because the paper wanted a journalist who could make cyber news accessible.⁠[4]

In January 2013 The New York Times disclosed that Chinese hackers had infiltrated its systems for four months, linked to its reporting on Premier Wen Jiabao’s family wealth; on January 31 Perlroth said on NPR that the malware had been seen in hundreds of other attacks and the command-and-control centers had been used by the Chinese military. China’s Ministry of National Defense said accusations without solid proof were baseless.⁠[5]

On February 5, 2020, she spoke as the Strauss Center’s inaugural “Journalist in Residence,” reviewing her reporting on Russian, North Korean and Iranian cyberespionage.⁠[4]

In 2021 Bloomsbury published her first book, This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race. Publishers Weekly’s review said it focuses on “zero-days,” the underground market for them and the destructive capacity of cyberweapons such as Stuxnet.⁠[6]

On May 26, 2021, she discussed the book with Stanford’s Andrew Grotto; the event description summarized her argument that the US government became the world’s dominant hoarder of zero-day vulnerabilities and then lost control of its hoard and of the market.⁠[7]

Writing in Foreign Policy, Tarah Wheeler said the book drew cheers from the public and praise from fellow journalists but also a notable wave of criticism from the cybersecurity community; she judged it profound on policy but marred by occasional factual errors and not reliable enough on technical details for policymakers.⁠[8]

In the Michigan War Studies Review, David Hadley found the book an accessible and compelling history of US cyberwarfare, though at times written in needlessly apocalyptic language that obscured differences in threat levels among cyber operations.⁠[9]

On December 1, 2021, Jen Easterly, director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), announced the first 23 members of its new Cybersecurity Advisory Committee, including Perlroth as a cybersecurity journalist.⁠[10]

On December 2, 2021, the book was announced as the winner of the £30,000 Financial Times and McKinsey & Company Business Book of the Year Award.⁠[11]

Roula Khalaf, FT editor and chair of the judges, said cybersecurity was not featuring highly enough on CEOs’ agendas and that she hoped the award would prompt them to read the book.⁠[12]

On February 20, 2022, she appeared on episode 266 of the Lex FridmanLex FridmanLex Fridman is a Soviet-born, US-raised computer scientist and podcast host who works as an MIT research scientist on human-AI interaction and autonomous driving. His Lex Fridman Podcast is known for hours-long conversations with guests including heads of state and technology leaders.Open the full entry Podcast, introduced as a cybersecurity journalist and author; topics included zero-day vulnerabilities, the history of hackers, ransomware attacks, cyberwar, social engineering, Snowden and whistleblowers, and the NSA.⁠[13]

As of May 2022 she had become an unpaid adviser to CISA; she said the idea came from fellow Princeton alum Kiersten Todt, chief of staff to the CISA director.⁠[1]

On June 18, 2024, it was announced that she had joined Ballistic Ventures as a venture partner.⁠[14]

On March 17, 2025, Rubrik appointed her “Chief Cyber Raconteur,” an advisory role, and launched her podcast To Catch a Thief: China’s Rise to Cyber Supremacy the same day. Rubrik said she left The New York Times in 2021 and that her reporting on commercial spyware had been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.⁠[15]

In April 2025 To Catch a Thief held a live recording at the New York Stock Exchange, where she discussed with David Barboza, Rob Joyce, Jen Easterly, Jim Lewis and Rubrik CEO Bipul Sinha how China’s state-sponsored hacking had shifted from corporate espionage to attacks on infrastructure.⁠[16]

In November 2025 MasterClass introduced a cybersecurity course taught by former CISA director Chris Krebs, former NSA director Paul M. Nakasone and her.⁠[17]

As of February 2026 she is a guest lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Business; she has two children and lives in Portola Valley.⁠[3]

X: Public account: https://x.com/nicoleperlroth (opens in a new window)⁠[13]

The New York Times: Official website: https://www.nytimes.com/ (opens in a new window)⁠[13]

Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency: Official website: https://www.cisa.gov/ (opens in a new window)⁠[10]