In its latest effort to create a platform of open communication for all employees, the U.S Department of Defense (DoD) has now given the green light to social networking for all DoD personnel on its networks, a move highlighted by the agency in a latest memorandum, where in the DoD has emphasized on the importance and necessity of social networks and has also asked its branches to promote and encourage the use of social networks by the personnel.

The use of social networks will greatly help the soldiers and other personnel who are currently deployed away from home and thus would now be able to stay connected with their family and friends, which in turn will sure help in elevating their spirits. As per the memorandum, the DoD IT administrators will be given authorization to limit the access to the internet in order to conserve bandwidth and maintain internal network security. Also, the DoD IT department will be constantly monitoring the network in use, to prevent the any sort of intrusion, all the while blocking access to websites that are related to pornography, online gambling and other unwarranted activities.

Previously, many of the service branches of the U.S DoD had blocked complete access to social networking websites, to maintain operational security. However, with this latest policy, all these services will now to have provide access to the social networks. Even with the previous ban of social networks like Facebook, MySpace, YouTube etc. many other agencies were found to have extensively employed these online services to reach to the users.

According to the U.S Department of Defense blog post,

“Service members and DoD employees are welcome and encouraged to use new media to communicate with family and friends — at home stations or deployed — but it’s important to do it safely. This is DoD’s first official policy on new media. Prior to today, the Services and other DoD components developed and implemented their own ad hoc policies — some banning it all together.”

Via PC World