US State Department tells employees not to read WikiLeaks

CSM ^ | December 1, 2010 | Ben Arnoldy

[La Lydia]

The US State Department has directed its staff around the world not to surf the WikiLeaks website, according to employees. The ban is in response to WikiLeaks' decision to published classified material, including US diplomatic cables. It’s not clear when the policy first began but it joins a similar order by the US Department of Defense put in place since the leaking of Iraq and Afghanistan war documents earlier this year.

Analysts suggest the State Department is temporarily falling back on traditional bureaucratic protocols in the face of a crisis that is emblematic of the shift to an online world. As the dust settles, the WikiLeaks upheaval may push to the fore tensions between new “digital diplomacy” efforts that use Twitter and smart-phone apps, and an older culture of classified cables.

“They need to engage with the broader public, which is empowered with web 2.0, but at the same time keep confidentiality, which is a huge tension that organizations like the State Department have to address,” says Jovan Kurbalija, an expert in diplomacy and information technology based in Geneva....

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has pushed for more integration of Internet advances in US diplomacy. She supported young, tech-savvy officers who were developing huge Twitter followings.

In East Africa, the State Department supported a competition called "Apps 4 Africa" that challenged software developers to come up with a socially beneficial phone application. The winner was "iCow," an application that helps farmers track animal breeding cycles....

But the embrace of modern communications has not necessarily included the underlying philosophy of information openness. Much diplomatic work still depends upon confidential conversations, and the WikiLeaks crisis has, so far, moved the agency toward more information restrictions....

[NOBO2]

Hillary must be petrified—all that is needed is ONE person from the diplomatic corps to come forward and say, YES, she prompted us to spy on foreign dignitaries. Her reputation is already shot as it is. I hear calls for her resignation in the background. To Hillary, foreign leaders are as worthless as Bill’s Bimbos.

[Squantos]

Yeah....if subject matter number 42(61524a was read 2 million times then the Hildibeast really is a skank...among skanks..

[CharlesWayneCT]

Absolutely right. If you look browse classified information on an unclassified system, from ANY source, it is considered a data spill, and your computer, and possibly the entire lan-connected system, needs to have the information purged using official methodolgy. Our employer has strictly warned all employees not to go near the leaks, and not to read online stories.

I’ve been avoiding all the wiki leak threads here.