Quite ridiculous microtale about the head of MI6’s wife being on Facebook. But what’s this, from Patrick Mercer MP?
The Conservative MP Patrick Mercer, who chairs the counter-terrorism sub-committee, said the mistake had left the Sawers family “extremely vulnerable”. Referring to Miliband’s suggestion that the incident was not significant, Mercer said: “If that is the case why has the site being taken down?” He also pointed out that military chiefs had warned that the Taliban get 80% of their intelligence from Twitter and Facebook.
Can he really believe this? Eighty per cent? What percentage of users of either are located in Afghanistan? I’m going to stick a target on the wall and say it’s much less than 1%, so this suggests that a very few people are very insecure indeed. Perhaps we could just ask the guy to knock it off, or post him to the Falklands?
I’d be surprised if 80 per cent of their intelligence didn’t come from informers, friendly civilians reporting where our patrols go, if not more. Rather like it did in Northern Ireland. And Patrick Mercer of all people ought to be well aware of the possibilities…
He’s got form for Chris Morris-esque nonsense, mind you; remember his role in the Glen Jenvey/Comedy Gladio affair? Some people are, indeed, very insecure indeed about the world of today, and it remains truly remarkable just what stuff a lot of MPs will happily read out to the camera without passing it through their brains. The question remains whether Facebook is a made-up Web site.