Opinion Trump, Yemen and a Signal: Look before you text

It’s the dreaded faux pas — perhaps among the most common — in the digital age. First, there is a niggling thought, a feeling that there was something awry in the message just sent. After all, in the frantic switching from app to app on the smartphone, there is often little mindfulness. Then, the creeping realisation that the message meant for a significant other or the snide remark made to one colleague about another or even an NSFW meme has been sent to the wrong person. The nightmare? It’s gone to a group. The message is then deleted in a hurry, with the hope that you did so before anyone saw it. Now, imagine that embarrassment on an international scale.

Earlier this month, an American journalist found himself added to a group chat on Signal — an app that is encrypted, but not approved for discussions on national security. It did not feature office gossip, or annoying “good morning” messages a la family groups. On it, it seems, were top-ranking members of Donald Trump’s administration discussing the pros and cons as well as details of the US attack on Yemen. Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth and National Security Advisor Michael Waltz, among other luminaries of the strategic establishment, were in the group. In fact, Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, reportedly received the invite from Hegseth. Like any good reporter, he reported on what he saw on the group chat.

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The Democrats, predictably, are trying to hold the US executive to account for a “security breach” and Trump, equally predictably, is downplaying the incident. In all the talk of digital security and hygiene, the blame games and jokes at the Republicans’ expense, the simplest solutions are being missed out. First, it might be better to have an old-fashioned meeting, in person, on sensitive matters. Second, if the written word is indeed needed, there’s an unhackable technology that has been in use for a few thousand years. Just write it down on a piece of paper and deliver it to the right person.