Defense Department Blocks All Web Access To The Guardian In Response To NSA Leaks

from the head-in-sand dept

Once again, the US government appears to be taking an incredible head-in-sand approach to the various leaks about NSA surveillance. The latest is that the Defense Department is now telling everyone in the DoD to block access to The Guardian's website, which was seen very clearly after it was discovered that the US army is blocking access to the Guardian's website from all Army computers. This is not only petty and stupid, but useless. First of all, while the Guardian has been breaking much of the news about the leaks, it's all picked up quickly elsewhere and discussed widely. Pretending that blocking the Guardian has any impact is just pure cluelessness in action. Second, just because the Guardian has broken some news stories, it doesn't mean it makes sense to block the entire site. That is only going to pique more interest from folks in the Army and the wider Defense Department who are now going to be curious why the government is banning access to one of the biggest newspaper websites in the world. The whole thing smacks of stupid desperation: it doesn't stop the leaks from happening, it doesn't stop anyone in the army from finding out about the leaks, it just seems petty and designed to alert more people that the Guardian is the source to follow on these leaks.