Pentagon Bans YouTube, MySpace
The Pentagon has opened up a new line of demarcation in an Information War, and U.S. troops and their families may be caught in the digital crossfire.
The Defense Department has announced it will begin blocking access on its computers and networks "worldwide" to YouTube, MySpace and 11 other popular Web sites, according to a memo sent Friday by Gen. B.B. Bell, the U.S. Forces Korea commander.
Soldiers serving overseas will therefore lose some of their online links to friends and loved ones back home. A high-ranking Army official said the ban would take effect Monday.
The military says it's worried that personal use on military computers is stealing bandwidth and perhaps hampering operations, reports CBS News correspondent Steve Kathan. They're also concerned that too much information may be getting out.
"This recreational traffic impacts our official DoD network and bandwidth ability, while posing a significant operational security challenge," the memo said.
The armed services have long barred members of the military from sharing information that could jeopardize their missions or safety, whether electronically or by other means.
The new policy is different because it creates a blanket ban on several sites used by military personnel to exchange messages, pictures, video and audio with family and friends.
Some of the sites provide important family links for soldiers overseas. Soldiers may miss out on homemade tributes or in sharing their videos and pictures from the fronts.
The flip side of this battle, too, is that soldiers will not be able to see videos posted by insurgents.
Iraqi insurgents or their supporters have been posting videos on YouTube at least since last fall, and the Army recently began posting its own videos on YouTube showing soldiers defeating insurgents and befriending Iraqis.
But the new rules mean many military personnel won't be able to watch those videos.
Members of the military can still access the sites on their own computers and networks, but Defense Department computers and networks are the only ones available to many soldiers and sailors in Iraq and Afghanistan.
If the restrictions are intended to prevent soldiers from giving or receiving bad news, they could also prevent them from providing positive reports from the field, said Noah Shachtman, who runs a national security blog for Wired Magazine.
"This is as much an information war as it is bombs and bullets," he said. "And they are muzzling their best voices."
The sites covered by the ban are:
* Video-sharing sites YouTube, Metacafe, IFilm, StupidVideos and FileCabi;
* Social networking sites MySpace, BlackPlanet and Hi5;
* Music sites Pandora, MTV, 1.fm and live365; and
* Photo-sharing site Photobucket.
Several companies have instituted similar bans, saying recreational sites drain productivity.
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