UK Media Told: Keep Power Stations and Sewage Works Secret, page 1

The UK Government are to request that locations of national infrastructure installations such as power stations and sewage works are not referred to in news items.
The UK Defence, Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee are in the process of drawing up new guidelines which will become part of Defence Advisory notice No 4, according to the UK's Emergency Planning Officers.
The Guardian newspaper reports that there is a debate ongoing in Whitehall as to the effectiveness of this policy.

www.guardian.co.uk

Keep power and sewage plants secret, media told

Richard Norton-Taylor
Saturday September 25, 2004
The Guardian

Newspaper editors and television producers are to be asked to avoid referring to such visible installations as sewage works and power stations on the grounds they are potential targets for terrorists.
The request has been prompted by growing anxiety in parts of Whitehall, notably the Home Office, concerned not least by a spate of drama documentaries about terrorist attacks.

After intense argument about whether the media should disclose the whereabouts of conspicuous locations - and their vulnerability - new media guidelines are being drawn up by the defence, press and broadcasting advisory committee which operates a system of voluntary self-censorship.

The committee will soon extend the reach of D notice number 4 which now concentrates on nuclear weapons and intelligence facilities, according to emergency planning officers.

It will be amended to cover a much wider range of "sensitive sites", including what Whitehall calls Britain's "critical national infrastructure", or CNI. It covers telecommunications, energy, transport and water.
One issue raised behind the scenes in Whitehall was whether the media should be dissuaded, not only from describing the locations of sensitive sites but from reporting any vulnerability in their defences.

The Home Office suggested that the media should not be allowed to report security lapses as a series of programmes and articles have recently done.

The argument appears to be that this would only help terrorists. The contrary argu ment is that such stories alert the authorities to gaps in security precisely so that they can make locations less vulnerable.

Those in the latter camp seem to have won the battle, on the grounds that if the media are going to pay any attention to D notice guidelines, then they may as well be as reasonable as possible.

It begs the question whether the D notice system is viable in the first place.

Please visit the link provided for the complete story.

This Whitehall debate over secrecy has been self evident in the UK media earlier this year. During June 2004 a media campaign caused a website that showed the location of many of the UK's so called "secret sites" to be taken down even though the Defence Advisory Committee assured the site operator that the site was legal. Fortunately that particular site has recently come back online.
The Whitehall debate over such matters will presumably carry on until the Government comes up with a coherent security policy.

Those who wish to examine present UK DA Notices should visit the DA Notice site

www.dnotice.org.uk...

[edit on 25-9-2004 by zero lift]

[edit on 25-9-2004 by zero lift]

[edit on 25-9-2004 by John bull 1]