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Effective OPSEC requires team-wide focus

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Tim Jenkins
  • 379th Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affairs
SOUTHWEST ASIA --  Careless talk costs lives. Loose lips sink ships. The enemy is listening. Starve him with silence. If you talk about where they are going, they may never make it there.

We've all seen these slogans or posters in one form or another, and although the designs and slogans have changed throughout the years, the underlying message never has. Operations Security is and will continue to be an essential element in working and living in a safe and secure environment.

Operations Security is the process of denying adversaries information about friendly intentions and capabilities. According to Capt. Richard Zeigler, 379th Air Expeditionary Wing chief of force protection, OPSEC should always be at the forefront of people's minds, especially in a deployed environment.

"The concern is we simply cannot operate with a stateside mindset here," he said. "I know sometimes we get the feeling that everything is good here and there's no one watching, no one listening and it's all business as normal. However, there's always that possibility and, just like if you were further down range, you have to keep those things in mind."

He added the best outlook to have is that someone is always watching and someone is always listening in everything we do. The OPSEC process is put into place to deny those who are listening the opportunity to learn of our capabilities, intentions, activities and limitations.

"It's not always the spy movie mentality where someone is standing behind the lamp post watching you," he said. "But in passing, everybody plays a role in keeping those operational aspects close hold and only to the people that need them."

Information deemed most important is compiled into a Critical Information List. People need to be careful about how they disclose it and how they use it in their day-to-day operations. According to Joint Publication 1-02, this critical information includes specific acts about friendly intentions, capabilities and activities which adversaries need to plan and act in a way to hinder mission accomplishment.

Keeping a close hold on information is the key aspect of OPSEC, and knowing what information is most important and how to properly deal with that information is crucial to running a well-oiled OPSEC machine.

"The Critical Information List includes anything dealing with day-to-day operations," said Tech. Sgt. Clifton King, 379 AEW force protection NCOIC of intelligence. "If you're dealing with information that's vital to the mission - vital to you completing your job every day -- that's what we're looking at."

To help protect this information, Sergeant King said there are several key OPSEC policies personnel should make consistent strides by which to live. One these policies includes the protection of written and electronic products.

For electronic products, Sergeant King said it's important to remember to encrypt e-mails containing critical information. Additionally, care should be taken when posting information to Web sites. Paper products should also be safeguarded and shredded after they are no longer of use.

"Whether it be personal documents, mailing labels, maps of the base, orders, printouts of transcripts, whatever the case may be, it is vital in some way," said Sergeant King.

Because the pickup of trash is contracted to a business off base, all of the installation's garbage has the potential to fall into the hands, and prying eyes, of someone it shouldn't. This could be damaging if the trash contains pieces of information vital to our operations.

"Each piece of information is giving away our capabilities, our strengths, what assets we have on base," said Sergeant King. "If the person has the information, they can develop a bigger picture, which can help them in building a plan to collect more information, or to even plan an attack."

Because small bits of information can be combined to form bigger pictures, Captain Zeigler said it is better to err on the side of over caution when deciding whether or not to shred documents.

"If one Airman thinks this one piece of trash isn't going to affect anything and puts it in the trash can, another Airman may be doing the same thing on the other side of the base, and so may other people --thinking this one piece isn't going to affect anything," he said. "However, you get to the point where you put all those things together. Individually, they might not mean anything, but together they could have an impact on our mission, our standing with the locals, all kinds of things. The littlest things are just as important as the big things."

Another concern is discarding damaged or unneeded uniform items, to include physical training gear.

"The disposal of uniforms, that's a huge issue," said Captain Zeigler. "By no means are uniforms a controlled item, but if they get into the wrong hands, bad things can happen, as we've seen in Afghanistan. So people just have to be aware of it."

Uniform drop boxes are located in high-traffic areas across the installation, where people can place their items to be destroyed, and kept out of the wrong hands.

"The uniform dumpsters are there so when an individual no longer needs a uniform item, they can place them in the uniform boxes rather than in the dumpster," said Sergeant King.

OPSEC not only applies to military members and their official communications. Friends and families back home can also pose OPSEC concerns, especially with the evolution of social media resources.

"It's always been easy for people to get information, but with the explosion of (social media), there's a lot more opportunity to innocently put the wrong information out," said Capt. Zeigler. "I don't think the view of OPSEC or people's concern with OPSEC has shifted; I just think there are more places for information to get out and as a result there are more places for people to find information."

According to Sergeant King, communicating with family members is perfectly acceptable and encouraged, as long as you don't cross the line of disclosing too much information about where you are, what you're doing and when you're going to be home.

"Just be as generic as possible in communication, to include posting information on Web sites or chat blogs," he said. "The bottom line is that people want to collect as much intelligence as they can on our operations. So let your families know to be sure they don't talk, in open, public places where people can overhear conversations, saying 'my husband, wife, son or daughter is deployed here or there. '"

Sergeant King also stressed that OPSEC doesn't only apply on base, but also when visiting the downtown areas of the host nation.

"Don't discuss your job off base," he said. "Avoid steering toward that type of conversation. Don't talk about rank, aircraft or locations on base. Just avoid conversations all together about your job and what you do there. People should practice OPSEC every minute of the day, no matter their location."

Captain Zeigler added that OPSEC is not a new concept, but can only be effective when everyone consistently applies it to their daily lives, on and off duty.

"Everyone knows what OPSEC is," said Captain Zeigler. "Everyone knows what they are supposed to do. It's just a reminder - for people to remember OPSEC when they're talking, e-mailing, texting or throwing away their trash."