Marines solidify ban on Facebook, Twitter

The new issued Monday, doesn't change much. Marines have not been allowed to access sites like FacebookFacebook, MySpace or TwitterTwitter from military networks. The Marines have simply put an official stamp on the ban, while also laying out the steps to take for any Marine who wants to access a site as part of his or her job. Alles zu Facebook auf CIO.de Alles zu Twitter auf CIO.de

"These Internet sites in general are a proven haven for and content and are particularly high risk due to information exposure, user generated content and targeting by adversaries," the directive noted. "The very nature of [social networking sites] creates a larger attack and exploitation window, exposes unnecessary information to adversaries and provides an easy conduit for information leakage ..."

The ban, however, is only for people using Marines' equipment and networks while they are working. Marines may still Twitter or post to Facebook on their own time and on their own computers.

The military isn't against using sites like Facebook and Twitter, said 1st Lt. Craig Thomas, a Pentagon-based spokesman for the Marine Corps.

The U.S. Central Command , a channel on YouTube and a Twitter account to get out information regarding operations news. The Army is using MySpace to recruit new soldiers and the on Facebook has more than 24,000 fans.