OPSEC not a concept to be tossed out

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Austin M. May
  • 100th Air Refueling Wing Public Affairs
RAF MILDENHALL, England --  In today's high-tech world, threats to personal identity have become common, and defense measures are constantly evolving to counter them.

Despite the availability of sophisticated security programs both on- and off-line, some precautions are as simple as watching what is thrown out in the trash.

According to Master Sgt. Tracy Carpenter, RAF Mildenhall's installation antiterrorism officer, everyone on base is responsible for protecting critical information and equipment. Things such as military uniforms and equipment, orders, anything which talks about mission planning, recall rosters or has personnel information such as social security numbers should be treated with care, he stated in an e-mail.

The master sergeant said during recent random checks of garbage bins around base, he found items such as military orders and complete sets of uniforms an adversary could use against the base and its people. He said he routinely checks trash containers for items that may be useful to an enemy.

"Antiterrorism and force protection is everyone's responsibility and we rely on personnel living and working on the base to act as sensors and report all suspicious activity to include safeguarding sensitive information," Sergeant Carpenter said. "By carelessly discussing critical information over the phone or at the local pub and not properly sanitizing military uniforms before disposing of them, we have just extended an open invitation to targeting by those wishing to cause us or our families harm."

Properly sanitizing a uniform means rendering it unserviceable by cutting holes in it or otherwise damaging it to a point where it could not be worn for official duties.

"If you're not going to donate it, make it unserviceable," Sergeant Carpenter said. "At the very minimum, cut all the patches off." He added papers with sensitive information should be shredded or burned, but never discarded whole.

Casual conversations can also yield bits and pieces of information that might prove useful to a person with harmful intentions.

The best way to ensure personal safety is to always be aware of your surroundings and aware of elicitation techniques our adversaries use to try and solicit information from you, Sergeant Carpenter said.

"No matter how harmless you think your conversation is, it is relatively another piece of the puzzle to a bigger picture our enemies are piecing together."

Anyone wishing to report suspicious or harmful activities, or wanting further details on operations security can contact their OPSEC manager, 100th Security Forces Squadron, Air Force Office of Special Investigations, their unit's antiterrorism monitor or Sergeant Carpenter at DSN 238-3127.

The master sergeant explained that terrorists usually monitor potential targets before selecting their final victims. In order to prevent becoming a target, people should make every attempt to deny the opportunity for their information or equipment to fall into the wrong hands.

"Terrorist attacks do not always happen to the next person," he said. "The next person could be me or you."