If you haven’t heard about NTWS yet, here’s your chance before it may be too late. The parent website of the website “affectionately” referred to as “Navy Myspace” is being called out by Air Force officials as an OPSEC nightmare.
A Brief History of TogetherWeServed: Back in 2003, TogetherWeServed.com was formed as a Marine Corps portal for keeping in touch with other grunts that you may have served with. In late 2006, the website opened up a new subdomain Navy.TogetherWeServed.com as an entirely different website, offering the same features to sailors. Quickly, this site became one of the most popular sites visited by sailors looking to get in touch with one another. I remember when this happened because every single day my inbox would be flooded with a bunch of “so and so has added you to their shipmates list” or something like that.
Well, now the TWS folks have gotten together to create an Air Force version and at the time of this writing, it already has over 57k profiles created on it.
When the Navy version came out, I don’t remember there being any kind of a fuss about it. However, now that the Air Force version is coming out, AF officials are warning Airmen that this site is an OPSEC nightmare. I wasn’t able to find many articles on this subject online yet but there were a few news stories on it here and here.
In the email I received, it was mentioned that some AF headquarters have even begun blocking the website, denying access to airmen at work and .mil computers. As of this writing, I was still able to access the site from a shipboard computer although it doesn’t do me any good because I’m not going to pay $20 to go to Navy Myspace.
March 17th, 2008 at 10:54 pm
Happy to clarify. The Air Force did not classify AirForce.Togetherweserved.com an OPSEC Nightmare. Only one person did who had never been a Member of the site. Read on for the truth. BTW Navy.TWS and Marines.TWS are extremely successful websites and we’ll be happy to upgrade your Membership - just let us know your Member Number.
In recent weeks AirForce.TogetherWeServed.com (AFTWS), which launched just before Christmas 2007 and reached 50,000 Members in just 4 weeks, has endured the consequences of one person’s dissemination of mis-information and the Air Force’s apparent willingness to embrace that mis-information, without question.
A PowerPoint OPSEC “training aid” was created by a field grade officer in a Special Operations Unit at Hurlburt Field, and e-mailed to OPSEC coordinators and PAO offices, throughout the Air Force, on January 30th. The problem with this document was that it was not properly researched, contained completely erroneous and misleading information, and entirely missed the point of what TWS is really all about.
Focused on AirForce.Togetherweserved.com, with screenshots and bullet point statements, this PowerPoint proceeded to state that AFTWS is German-owned and operates out of Nova Scotia - this is surprising as Togetherweserved.com is actually a California corporation, it’s official address is in Chatsworth; and all TWS servers are located in Downtown Los Angeles as clearly stated in the About Us section on our Home Page!
The fact that all TWS websites are run entirely by former US Marines, Sailors, Soldiers and Airmen to the highest professional standards expected by its military personnel Members was mentioned nowhere in the brief. The PowerPoint appeared to convey the impression that TWS is run by faceless foreign nationals, and not Sgt.Maj. Joe Armstrong (USMC Retired), Maj. Wes Prater (USMC Retired), SCPO Anthony Costello (USN Retired), and SMSgt. Jim Franklin (USAF Retired), who head TWS’s “sharp end.”
It then proceeded to highlight that AFTWS is not endorsed by the DOD as if this was some kind of impediment. What appears to be misunderstood is that TWS websites are private, not government-created — which are funded with taxpayer dollars, and all non-government websites which have a military focus or theme are required, by law, to display the disclaimer that they are not endorsed by, or affiliated with, the DOD. Even the U.S. Naval Institute website falls into this category.
The PowerPoint expounds further on other misgivings and suppositions, geared towards stirring discomfort and possibly even paranoia, but made no mention of the fact that TWS has operated successfully for over four years with its Marines and Navy sites, without one report of any OPSEC incident in that entire time concerning any of its 500,000 Members. Because of their military training, TWS Members do use the same common sense regarding posting operationally-sensitive information on their profile as they would in any other environment, particularly those deployed as boots on the ground in combat zones. Members appreciate the fact that TWS not only has effective information-protection mechanisms - member contact information is automatically hidden by default and members can privacy-protect any sensitive information, including photographs, by way of a simple check box - but TWS Members are also fellow GIs, and are diligent when it comes to “watching the backs” of their Shipmates, Brothers and Wingmen.
TWS is like any other communications company such as your ISP or phone company - we provide the means for Members to communicate and our Members use the same discretion on TWS in regards to OPSEC as they would in an e-mail or in a phone conversation. It is highly unlikely that Air Force commands would discriminate against an ISP, E-mail provider or a phone company, as they appear to with TWS, because they provide the potential for a user to commit an OPSEC violation over their network.
What’s especially ironic about some of the claims made in this PowerPoint is that the information displayed on TWS Member profile pages is little different to what’s prominently displayed in the biography pages of hundreds of senior commanding officers on the USAF’s official website - http://www.af.mil - which are fully open to the general public. TWS simply provides additional means for Members to search for others they may have served with, along with dedicated forums and messaging facilities to enable Members to enjoy the camaraderie of other service personnel.
Had the officer made the slightest effort to contact TWS with any concerns and submitted helpful suggestions to address additional OPSEC considerations, important to him, which we could easily accommodate within our software, this unfortunate incident could have been entirely avoided and Airforce.Togetherweserved.com would continue to flourish in exactly the same secure and enjoyable manner as our own Navy.Togetherweserved.com.
A Navy TWS Member summarized the TWS spirit very succinctly in the following taken from one of our recent Forums:
“So why does NTWS perform? As I said, two reasons:
1. The site is safe. I have been a member for just over a year now (got my star on my ribbon last week!) and have not received one spam, one virus, one offer to help a Mongolian overlord reclaim his throne in exchange for $5000 of my hard earned dollars. And those who attempt to infiltrate this safe haven are quickly squashed like the insects they are. The members realize what a good thing we got here, and when something doesn’t seem right, plenty of members report them. We police ourselves, and dammit, I like that.
2. We all have more than one common bond. Yes, being Navy is obvious, but it goes beyond that. I mean, Maxie is what, 172 years old? And he is one of the more popular people on this site, young and old and in between. I find things in common with the Master Chief who retired 15-20 years ago along with the SN who just reported to her first ship, or the person who decided to get out after their first enlistment. I think if you joined this site,and are active on it, then the Navy meant something to you. Loved it or hated it, it meant something, and we can reconnect with whatever it was. There are times when I actually feel like I’m still in uniform. And when people PM me for advice, even though I’m retired and I never met them, well damn, what is that in my eye?
For those military branches that block this site because they see it as a threat, I think they need to do a little more research. I don’t think you’ll find a more closely guarded group in the public domain.”
After being contacted by TWS’s Senior Military Advisor, the officer, in question, realized his error and attempted an immediate clarification of his presentation to his distribution list, but to no avail - the damage was done. This PowerPoint had already started to make its rounds, and the Air Force began to systematically block access to the Airforce.Togetherweserved.com’s website from most of its bases and installations. Unit commanders, fueled with the Powerpoint mis-information forwarded by their PAO offices and OPSEC managers, commenced issuing notices to their Airmen, demanding that they avoid joining AirForce.Togetherweserved.com at all costs and any that had already joined to clear out their profiles immediately.
The following, one of several different examples forwarded to AFTWS, was distributed by the commander of a USAF Medical Operations Squadron:
“The attached slide show and the message string below highlight a significant Operations Security (OPSEC) threat that has recently surfaced on the Web. This “Together We Served” website has no DoD affiliation and is, in fact, based in Canada, with the parent company in Germany……”
Even their own criminal investigative agency, AFOSI, also bought into the faulty gouge. This lead to a video news package being produced by an AFN outlet in Incirlik, Turkey, which was then installed on every official USAF command website urging airmen to avoid joining the Air Force “My Space” owned by a “German company operating out of Nova Scotia!” It took several days and many phone calls to get this video removed from these websites.
In spite of all attempts to undermine the site, AirForce.Togetherweserved.com is alive and well and Members have shown their full support of the site with less than 1% of Members canceling their accounts or clearing their profiles.
May 16th, 2008 at 5:15 am
Come on man, it’s not like $20 is gonna break you.
Besides you can find several different uses for the site. Heck I got in touch with personnel at potential duty stations I was looking at for orders and now I am still in contact with the guy I am replacing.
Now get back to school.
June 9th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Well, when I left for Iraq last year. I was able to access together we served at work and in most computers we use there. Since I’ve returned I have been unable to access it. I truely think the Navy has banned the site or maybe just my command. Perhaps they have good reason to do so, for it is a social net working site. Still work is work and we should be working, this is understandable and reasonable. Yet, I miss going to the site and showing my fellow corpsman the corpsmans I’ve served with and the Marines. They just need to work on that glitch on being able to add each other from Marines to Navy to Airforce… and soon Army and Coast Gaurd. Anyway, my point is I for one am glad for the site and if you place some confidential data in it then that is on you breaking that confidentiality. It is and as far as I know will always be a social networking site and nothing more.
Of course, its geared especially for us… the members of those who protect our very nation and their families and friends.
August 4th, 2008 at 7:01 pm
Without having visited the site yet, my first concern is that the site itself contacted me at my official email address. They should not be asking users to input the names and email addresses of their friends. That is getting information about somebody without their consent. The “friend” should send an email to the user with a link to the site, not the site sending it with the “friend” email address in the From line. That is the only thing that raised my suspicion about this site. As for the site location, you can take a look at http://www.whois.sc and find out they are indeed in California. Feel free to add this site to your IA security list for identifying source websites.