Social Media as a Potential Threat to Defense Department?

After talking to Mike Andrews, who has worked in the Department of Defense the past four years after 21 in active duty in the Navy, he has sparked my interest in wondering what’s best for the Defense Department. From what I have been hearing from businessmen and social-media experts, I would have thought that using social media is best for every company. It’s an easy way to disseminate information. But when talking about federal and defense agencies, the conversation of security comes into play. To protect the safety of those working for the DoD, would it be best for once if a business didn’t involve themselves in social media?

Those working under the Department need to know they are receiving information from the right people. It’s also important that American citizens are getting the right information from the right people. The first thing that comes to mind is imposters on Twitter, pretending they are celebrities. We don’t need that same thing happening with government agencies. Another issue that I could initially see with government workers using social media is the chance that they could divulge confidential information that may threaten the security of the nation.

Andrews said, “the DoD currently does not have a formal policy on the use of social media, but realities are going to force that point very soon.” According to “DoD social-media policy review nears completion,” from Government Computer News, the Department should come to a conclusion on balancing social media outlets such as Facebook and Twitter by the end of October 2009.

Some departments, like the United States Marine Corps, ban social media on government computers. Without a purpose and waiver from the Marine Corps, civilians and Marines are not allowed to use social media on government time, said Ray Letteer, senior information assurance official for the Marine Corps (DoD and Marine Corps Speak Out on Social Media Ban). Letteer said the Corps has abided by the DoD policy since it was enacted in February of 2007. He said the Corps wants to “move in smartly, carefully and do it the right way the first time.”
Civilians and military personnel are, however allowed to use social media on their own personal computers, including the ones available to troops overseas, Letteer said. But will everyone know how use it?

Jeremy Mishkin, attorney and expert in e-commerce and web-based businesses, brought up a good point in the GCN article that the government first needs to determine what security problems it has with social media and then teach employees how to move it from “toy to tool.”
Government agencies, particularly the DoD, could capitalize on the ability to disseminate information rapidly when using social media while meetings its citizens where they already are.
It’s a tough topic and I don’t really know if there’s one right or wrong answer. If allowed, the social media outlets used by government officials will have to be heavily over sought. After all, we want to be safe and make sure our daily “updates” are not compromising national security. Hopefully, once it becomes the norm, people will understand the dos and don’ts of communicating and be sensitive to the needs of the “old guard,” and less oversight will be needed.

*A special thanks to Mike Andrews for inspiring and helping guide my post