U.S. Military Blocked Some Soldiers From Accessing Southern Baptist Website Over 'Hostile Content'?

Christian Post ^ | 04/26/2013 | Jeff Schapiro

[SeekAndFind]

A U.S. Army officer who tried to access the Southern Baptist Convention's website on a government computer says he instead received a message indicating the site was blocked "due to hostile content."

According to a press release from the American Family Association, a group the officer informed about the incident, the message said SBC.net was being blocked by "Team CONUS," the Continental US Theater Network Operations and Security Center and Regional Computer Emergency Response Team.

A Defense Department spokesperson said in an email to The Christian Post that the block is not intentional, and the department is working to solve the issue "as quickly as possible."

"The Department of Defense strongly supports the religious rights of service members, to include their ability to access religious websites like that of the SBC," the statement reads. "With Internet technology constantly evolving, the Department is working to ensure that service members have access to an open Internet while preserving information and operational security."

The spokesperson also said in a phone interview that the site was not blocked for all personnel, but only for those at certain military installations, and that a number of factors could have contributed to the problem with the automated Internet filters.

Roger S. "Sing" Oldham, vice president for convention relations for the SBC, told CP via email that the situation is "deeply disturbing" despite the government's assurance that the block was not set up intentionally.

"While the Defense Press Operations office of the US Army has assured us this is a random event with no malicious intent, the Army must run this to the ground to assure that this is the case," wrote Oldham. "If the government blocked any portion of the SBC.net Web site for any purpose, that would be an unconscionable breach of trust with the American public. The First Amendment exists to protect the church from governmental censorship of or infringement upon religious speech and the free exercise of religion."

Earlier this month, Rep. Randy Forbes (R-Va) said he has been monitoring religious discrimination complaints from service members for the last four years.

"It's been a steady attack on faith and religious freedom that we've seen in our military like we've never seen before," Forbes told Fox News. "We are getting a lot of calls from soldiers saying 'we're afraid of going to church, we're afraid to be seen praying, we're afraid that would hurt our careers, our promotions.'"

Forbes also questioned Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel about a number of military-related religious liberty issues during a House Armed Services Committee meeting earlier this month.

[svcw]

wow

[deks]

Military official: Malware to blame for site block

http://www.sbcbaptistpress.org/BPnews.asp?ID=40162

[Defiant]

I wonder if Islamic web sites were blocked?

[FlingWingFlyer]

Probably the dirty work of the DADT fairies.

[The Working Man]

I have to laugh once again when I think about what I went through as a contractor working for the Air Force.

I had two primary customers, The Air Force was the BIG one I supported them daily. And NASA was the other, I dealt with them regularly but not daily.

The NASA.ORG website was a prohibited site on the Air Force system. I had to get special permissions to unblock it so I could get info off of there.

So am I surprised at this? Absolutely not. I think that the Air Force security people would be the happiest if you couldn’t get on the internet at all.

[fini]

Having dealt with govt IT security for many years, this is probably just an error with an automated filter. Because a lot of filters are automated, it is often impossible to determine why a website is blocked, because no one has the time to figure out what triggered the filter. In most cases, all the user needed to do was request access and the website would manually be removed from the "denied" list.

One day our own base's website was denied access "due to malicious content." Needless to say, that incident inspired many jokes. Even the base general joked that "he had worked in hazardous locations under dangerous conditions" but this was the first time he worked at a "malicious place."

[Cvengr]

FR has been blocked for several months now.