Israeli military calls off "cleaning-up" operation after soldier boasting on Facebook

Wired's DangerRoom/ here

"... In Israel, the military had to call off an entire operation after a trooper posted the time and place of an upcoming raid in the West Bank on his Facebook page. D’oh! According to Associated Press, the soldier boasted that his unit was planning on “cleaning up” the village.

It’s the kind of scenario that keeps military planners up at night: A meticulously planned operation goes dangerously awry because some dolt couldn’t resist telling every one of their Facebook friends or Twitter peeps about it. In this case, the Israelis moved swiftly to respond.

“Fellow soldiers reported the leak to military authorities, who called off the raid fearing that the information may have reached hostile groups,” the AP noted. “The soldier was court-martialed and sentenced to 10 days in prison.”

It’s doubly interesting to read about this case, because the Israeli military has worked very hard to use social networking as an information warfare tool. During Operation Cast Lead in late 2008 and early 2009, the the Israeli military started its own YouTube channel to distribute footage of precision airstrikes; Israeli diplomats even hosted a press conference on Twitter."