- Loose lips sink Ships -

{Illustration by U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander McClelland Barclay, part of the Navy’s “Loose Lips Sink Ships” WWII campaign, to remind those with “war jobs” not to discuss the nature of their work. Courtesy Navy Art Collection, Naval Historical Center}

  

     Hey everyone! A unfortunate event happened earlier this week where a spouse (whose sailor is on my Husbands ship) publicly passed on confidential information via Facebook. Their sailor emailed them some information that was not approved to be passed on by the Captain. So, unfortunately…they are both at fault. It is SO important for us to keep any information that we are given, by our Sailors, “hush hush”. Careers can be ruined and lives jeopardized!

     I want to share with you some “words of wisdom” that my Ombudsmen emailed us, due to this event:

• “Chances are, if I have not put anything out yet, then the command has not authorized the sailors to share that news with the families yet.” - So VERY true, always keep information guarded in your heart until a confirmation has been given out by the Ombudsmen. The Ombudsmen is our “life line” when it comes to giving/receiving information and confirming it.

• “Posting anything about such information in a public forum (such as Facebook… it does not matter what kind of security you think you have, its a public website) is absolutely NOT permitted and it is a violation of OPSEC.” - Knowing OPSEC is extremely important. It keeps our Military Men & Women safe. I have provided it below. Pass along to Family and Friends. It’s important that we practice OPSEC.

OPSEC

1. Do not post exact deployment dates or redeployment dates
2. Do not reveal camp locations, including nearby cities. After the deployment is officially announced by Military officials, you may discuss locations that have been released, normally on the Country level.
3. Do not discuss convoy routes (“we traveled through Takrit on our way to X”)
4. Detailed information on the mission, capabilities or morale of a unit
5. Specific names or actual nicknames
6. Personnel transactions that occur in large numbers (Example: pay information, powers of attorney, wills, etc)
7. Details concerning security procedures, response times, tactics
8. Don’t discuss equipment or lack thereof, to include training equipment
9. Don’t speculate about future operations
10. If posting pictures, don’t post anything that could be misconstrued or used for propaganda purposes. A good rule of thumb is to look at your picture without your caption or explanation and consider if it could be re-captioned to reflect poorly on coalition forces. For example, your image might show your soldier rescuing a child from a blast site, but could be re-captioned to insinuate that the child being captured or harmed. (it’s happened!)
11. Avoid the use of count-up or count-down tickers for the same reason as rule #1
12. Be very careful if posting pictures of your loved one. Avoid images that show significant landmarks near their base of operations, and black out last names and unit affiliations
13. Do not, ever, post information about casualties (coalition or enemy) before the official release of the information.
14. Do not pass on rumors (“I heard they’re coming home early”, etc)