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US Military Surrenders To Social Media, Changes Access Restrictions

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the mcpon-needs-more-facebook-friends dept.

Thanks to a new policy by the Department of Defense, members of the US Military will now have limited access to social media sites. "According to the memorandum, members of military departments and all authorized users of the Non-classified Internet Protocol Router Network (NIPRNET) can now use the publicly accessible capabilities of various social networking and user-generated content sites, instant messaging, forums, and e-mail. This includes YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and others. Access to porn, gambling, or hate crime sites will remain restricted, however, and commanders can cut down on social media use if they feel the need to 'preserve operations security.'"

3 of 96 comments (clear)

  1. no OPSEC here! by adosch · · Score: 4, Interesting

    When I was deployed to Iraq in '03 to early '05, I had to give up my IT job and go be a grunt for 18 months, and because I didn't have a MOS to prove my skills do some domineering douche E-6 admin, I got to convoy and do escort security. Being the convoy guy, you had access to the motor pool, so I'd get in a humvee once in awhile and do some war-driving on base with what little techie equipment I brought with me just for my own amusement. What amazed me what not only my findings themselves, but news that our officers in our unit would make the commo guys hook 802.11b/g routers up to NIPRnet (unsecured, mind you) so they could have free-range internet in their tents while the rest of us sucked it up in line for hours to get 5 minutes to write an e-mail and have some troll look over my shoulder to make sure I wasn't typing and "sensitive position information" in my e-mail (as if the Iraqi's don't know where all our bases is anyway! Isn't that why I got motor attacked twice a week?).

    The point I'm trying to make is OPSEC in the military is a illusion and a joke and operate under the phrase "Do as I say, not as I do". The highest official is going to thrust down on the enlisted and preach being operationally secure, but it's the same guy who wanted NIRPnet broadcasted over an unsecure wifi router for 'convenience'.

    1. Re:no OPSEC here! by GiveBenADollar · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Same general thing on ship. Internet secured prior to port visits for opsec, but half the officers have wives waiting for them in port. I just told my family that if they wanted to know where I was going they should just check the news because CNN would know before I did. Officers are assumed to be more responsible and therefore given more privileges, but in reality it doesn't work that way.

  2. Re:Ugggh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    It's not an either or proposition, we have e-mail access to most web sites now. The bottleneck for most people in the field and on ships is bandwidth, not access.

    What's driving this is the mid-to-high level chain of command, who has this fantasy that the next war is going to be fought over the Internet and we'd better not miss out, and don't understand the underlying security issues AT ALL.

    And yes, being able to see what unit Johnny is in and who his friends are is a huge security risk. Now I can send him phishing emails with malicious attachments that appear to be from his wife, and all I have to do is look on Facebook.

    We should be locking down the network, not opening it up.