The Guardian can still publish, is why.
The government telling people in its employ that they can't read the publication is a different matter from the government telling people they're not allowed to publish.
The government telling people in its employ that they can't read the publication is a different matter from the government telling people they're not allowed to publish.
I would be willing to bet that the agreement you signed to get your security clearance didn't have a 9-to-5 provision. You may not be charged for it, but that doesn't mean you aren't violating that agreement by accessing classified information for which you don't have "need to know".
Anyway, all employees received an official statement earlier in June warning against viewing those documents using lab computers (including lab computers used off-site), but with no warning against viewing them off-site on personal computers.
Those employees are voters too and have a right (and possibly a democratic duty) to be informed. No employment contract should ever restrict your ability to remain properly informed.
Isn't With the same argument chinese internet firewalls are "not censorship". OR With the same argument access to social media or telephone "not censorship".
Right. As long as they use that judgement to avoid reading classified information. ;-)
> Army is taking proactive steps
As far as I understand (and please note that I'm not an expert) they have always blocked certain kinds of sites. That Guardian is added is not really surprising, but the indirect refusal to own up to it is whacky.
It might be a bit petty and bureaucratic, but hey, considering the Streisand effect I say go for it... it's bound to make a few people check it out that weren't interested before, and I doubt it will keep anyone from reading what they were interested in already.
That material isn't just available at that URL, so the only way to be sure is to inspect traffic for the data. So what is this other than a pointless token gesture, or incompetence?
And there are other things other than that material at the Guardian. It's, like, a full blown newspaper. That's what makes it seem petty.
Thanks for being upfront with your bigotry. So, I know that there's no point in wasting time on trying to have an honest discussion.
If the rules truly preclude contact with any secret info (even if it has already leaked) without wiping the machines and the machines have internet access, they need to revise the rules as they are absurd. What they should be concerned about is stopping leaks of more information (quite possible), not controlling information that has already leaked (impossible).
The most absurd part of this whole catch 22 'can't look at or talk about past secrets' situation however is that the administration leaks classified information all the time in service of their own aims - for example the Osama Bin Laden raid and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. Those leaks are considered good leaks, and the information leaked is just fine (in spite of not being officially declassified) sitting on government computers, in Hollywood propaganda films, and being disseminated widely and quoted unattributed by news anchors and in American media - those websites are not blocked, because those are somehow rightous leaks, but it makes a mockery of any pretension of secrecy hygiene on military computers, plenty of which access plenty of this classified information that the government chose to disseminate without declassifying.
Given the free use of sanctioned leaks, these rules are more about instilling a fear of the taint of suspicion in government employees, and consequently of whistleblowers, than about data security IMHO.
But consider this: You find documents marked "secret" on a laptop. What do you do? The documents happens to be possible to find online. Do you just shrug and move on? How do you know that this laptop was not used in the leak? What if you find thousands of different documents across your network. How do you verify whether or not they have leaked previously?
At the very least you end up spending more resources verifying that this was not caused by a security problem.
And the idea of spamming the military with classified documents would be hilarious to see in practice... I wonder what they'd do...