DoD Defends Decision to Yank YouTube - The Diigo Meta page

• 30 Oct 07
  

  TransTracker

  milblogging opsec social_networking

  • Pentagon officials are standing behind their decision to yank access to YouTube, MySpace and other social websites, saying the websites hog bandwidth and sometimes pose security risks.
    

    The Defense Department made headlines earlier this year when it blocked access to the sites from military computers. In May, YouTube officials said they were pushing the Pentagon to reconsider. But this month, Army officials said they have no plans to back down and may block even more sites.

  • Deployed troops can still get to these websites from kiosks that access the commercial Internet
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  • • "Quite frankly, we had some other issues with respect to YouTube," said Maj. Gen. Jeffrey Sorenson, the Army's chief information officer. He cited an instance where a soldier's video showed up on a "terrorist website" and was altered to suggest that the solider opposed the Iraq war and wanted the U.S. to bring all its troops home.
      

      "Once it's on the Internet it's always going to be there," Sorenson said. "In many cases some of these videos, unfortunately, were being maliciously affected."

    • Even though the Army limits soldier access to YouTube, the service isn't shy about using the site for its own marketing efforts. A link to "Army Videos on YouTube" is at the top of Army A-Z, a web portal right off the Army home page. It sends viewers to a message from Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey, linked to snippets on the "events and achievements of today's Army."

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