cyberwar
Department of Defense switches default policy on social media to ‘open’
As of last Friday, all US servicemen have been able to update social networks like Twitter and Facebook from non-classified military network computers. The announcement by the Department of Defense is the first time a single policy has been used across all branches of the Armed Forces and effectively reverses a Marine Corps ban on […]
Read beyond the “Marines ban Twitter…” headline
Articles like this one with the headline ‘Marines Ban Twitter, Facebook, MySpace" have been doing the rounds in the media. But it’s important to read beyond the headline. Because if you just read headlines you end up with a really distorted picture of the world. (You always did but I’d suggest it’s even worse in […]
Truth: The first casualty of the Russo-Georgia War
Today, I’ve been multi-tasking: spending some time spying (with permission, I should add) on the BBC’s news operation, keeping one eye on the tennis, and reading a very interesting paper on the media and the Russian invasion of Georgia. I can’t really talk too much about the former (yet) and I don’t suppose many of […]
Strategic communications in post-conflict countries
I’ll soon be heading into London for a two-day conference where participants will be discussing strategic communications from various organisational perspectives – military, international, humanitarian, and media. On today’s agenda we have: – A key note from Nik Gowing on the ‘new tyranny of shifting information power in crises‘. – A discussion between General Sir […]
Iran Election: links on media coverage 2
The same deal as yesterday but today instead: Al Jazeera English Journalist uses Twitter to get commentary on Iran. BBC Changing the website to green was NOT a gesture of support to the protesters. Director of Global News says UGC offers authenticity to BBC coverage. Have Your Say team interact with Twitterer. Jon […]
Iran Election: links on media coverage
This is a list of links I’ve been collecting on media coverage of the Iran election protests. It’s far from complete but it’s a start at least and hopefully it helps identify some of the main themes that are emerging. To that end, I’ve tried to group together links, although you’ll notice that there […]
How the IDF fell off the social media bandwagon
I’ve been thinking for a while about how the Israeli Defence Force used social media during the conflict in Gaza and I’m not at all convinced the campaign was successful. Yes, the IDF was right to engage with the Internet and social media. But the way they went about it was questionable. I have two […]
Gaza media coverage – war 2.0, social media and cyberwar
War 2.0 Adrian Monck assesses Israel’s online propaganda operation. He notes: “Back in January 2008, 26 IDF ‘combat cameramen’ held a fortnight long exercise with US military camera teams, and were “drilled in the use of wireless image transmission technology.” Which is interesting. You can’t help but think that the IDF must have had a […]
Terrorists to use Twitter?
A report by the US Army says Twitter, the popular microblogging tool, is a weapon that could be used by Al Qaeda to help them carry out attacks. The full report put together by the 304th Military Infantry Battalion can be viewed here (pdf) and Wired magazine has a good summary of the main points. […]
Warfare in virtual worlds
Last week, I was speaking on a panel at a departmental conference about new media and war. It was great to meet Tim Stevens, one of my co-panellists, who gave a fascinating talk on violence and warfare in ‘virtual’ worlds like Second Life. I put virtual in inverted commas because one of the points Tim […]
Russo-Georgia Conflict: a collection of links
I’ve been taking a break from blogging recently but I’m hoping to get going again now September is here and those not-so-balmy August days are behind us. If you’ve been following the conflict and ongoing confrontation between Russia and Georgia, you might be interested in my delicious links on the topic. (Delicious is a social […]
Russo-Georgia War: cyber-propaganda
“In its war with Georgia, the first truly global user-generated conflict, Russia’s digital guerillas have been drafted into a state-waged propaganda war” The opening paragraph of an excellent article by Evgeny Morozov on Open Democracy. He argues that the Web’s democratic potential has been undermined by the agendas of nation-states and maintains that ‘digital guerillas’ […]
Cyberwar, blogging and other Russo-Georgia War links
I’ve just got back from an all too brief holiday and this morning I’ve been collecting some stuff on the conflict between Russian and Georgian forces in South Ossetia and beyond. 1. While most of the attention has rightly been on the physical war that has been costing Russian and Georgian lives, Wired has nevertheless […]