Policies

User Agreement

The following User Agreement (“Agreement”) governs the use of official Department of Defense social media sites and pages to include social networking pages, blogs and file sharing sites, along with all policies applicable to DoD information. Please read the rules contained in this Agreement carefully. You can access this Agreement any time. Your use of any aspect of this website will constitute your agreement to comply with these rules. If you cannot agree with these rules, please do not use this website. The Agreement may be modified from time to time; the date of the most recent revisions will appear on this page, so check back often. Continued access of the website by you will constitute your acceptance of any changes or revisions to the Agreement. Your failure to follow these rules, whether listed below or in bulletins posted at various points in the website, may result in suspension or termination of your access to the website, without notice.
 
Comments By Others Are Not Endorsed: The Department of Defense does not necessarily endorse, support, sanction, encourage, verify or agree with the comments, opinions, or statements posted on the website. Any information or material placed online, including advice and opinions, are the views and responsibility of those making the comments and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense, the United States Government or its third party service providers. By submitting a comment for posting, you agree that the Department of Defense, the United States Government and its third party service providers are not responsible, and shall have no liability to you, with respect to any information or materials posted by others, including defamatory, offensive or illicit material, even material that violates this Agreement.
 
Editing and Deletions: The Department of Defense reserves the right, but undertakes no duty, to review, edit, move or delete any material submitted as a comment to the information provided for display or placed on the social media sites in its sole discretion, without notice. Comments submitted to these sites will be reviewed and a representative sample may be posted on the site or inappropriate comments may be deleted at the sole discretion of the Department of Defense. Remember this is an official DoD website, and you represent yourself when commenting. Senior Army leaders will, at times, read these comments. We hope to receive submissions from all viewpoints, but we ask that all participants agree to the following Terms of Participation:
  • To ensure constructive questions, please post only questions directly related and relevant to the Department of Defense.
  • Refrain from posting questions that contain threats, obscenity, material that would violate the law if published here, abusive, defamatory or sexually explicit material.
  • Submissions containing the following will be deleted:
    • Contains obscene or threatening language or discrimination (hate speech) based on race, sex, gender, religion, national origin, age, or disability.
    • Promotes services or products (not including non-commercial links that are relevant to the topic)
    • Includes any personal or sensitive information (phone numbers, email or postal addresses)
  • Operational Security (OPSEC). All personnel (including families and friends of service members) have a responsibility to ensure that no information that might put our military members in jeopardy or would be of use to our adversaries is posted to websites that arereadily accessible to the public. Not surprisingly, that information includes, among other things, technical information, operation plans,troop movement schedules, current and future locations of military units and ships, descriptions of overseas bases, details of weaponssystem, or discussions of areas frequented by service members overseas. Other information that’s not as obvious but should also not be discussed in an open forum includes daily military activities and operations, equipment status, unit morale, and results of operations. Any of these topics, if released in an open medium, have the ability to provide our adversaries opportunities to harm our military members.
External Links: The appearance of external hyperlinks does not constitute endorsement by the Department of Defense of the linked websites, or the information, products or services contained therein. The Department of Defense does not exercise any editorial control over the information you may find at these locations. All links are provided consistent with the stated purpose of these websites.
 
Disclaimer: Reference herein to any specific commercial products, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government, and shall not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes. With respect to documents available from this server, neither the United States Government nor any of its service members or employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, including the warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights.

 

Privacy & Security

Information available at ncojournal.dodlive.mil is consistent with Army and Department of Defense policies and The Principles of Information and contains information cleared for public release. Information intended for the internal Army audience is available through Army Knowledge Online (AKO) at www.us.army.mil.

The SGM-A website is provided as a public service by the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy, Fort Bliss, Texas.

Information presented on the NCOLCoE website is considered public information and may be distributed or copied unless otherwise specified. Use of appropriate byline/photo/image credits is requested.

The use of copyrighted material by the NCOLCoE is subject to U.S. copyright law as reflected in Army regulations. It is Army policy to recognize and respect the rights of copyright owners. More information on the Army’s use of copyrighted materials.

For site management, information is collected for statistical purposes only. This government computer system uses software programs to create summary statistics, which are used for such purposes as assessing what information is of most and least interest, determining technical design specifications, and identifying system performance or problem areas.

For site security purposes and to ensure that this service remains available to all users, this government computer system employs software programs to monitor network traffic to identify unauthorized attempts to upload or change information, or otherwise cause damage.

Except for authorized law enforcement investigations, no other attempts are made to identify individual users or their usage habits. Raw data logs are used for no other purposes and are scheduled for regular destruction in accordance with National Archives and Records Administration guidelines.

At the NCOLCoE, we want all viewers to be able to experience the stories of the Academy and the NCO Corps. We have and continue to strive to be sure all sections of ncolcoe.army.mil are in compliance with Section 508 standards. If you find something that is not compliant, please let us know via the Contact Us link in the menu bar.

Unauthorized attempts to upload information or change information on this service are strictly prohibited and may be punishable under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 and the National Information Infrastructure Protection Act.

If you have any questions or comments about the information presented here, please forward them to us using the Contact Us link in the menu bar.

Cookie Disclaimer

The NCOLCoE website does not use persistent cookies (persistent tokens that pass information back and forth from the client machine to the server). The NCOLCoE may use session cookies (tokens that remain active only until you close your browser) in order to make the site easier to use. The Department of Army does not keep a database of information obtained from these cookies. You can choose not to accept these cookies and still use the site, but it may take you longer to fill out the same information repeatedly and clicking on the banners may not take you to the correct link. Refer to the help information in your browser software for instructions on how to disable cookies.

Use of Copyrighted Material

This section specifically addresses the distribution of copyrighted material to external sources by the NCOLCoE.

  • The use of copyrighted material within the Army is subject to U.S. copyright law as reflected in the above references and other sources. It is Army policy to recognize and respect the rights of copyright owners. This page does not create any right, remedy, or cause of action for any person against the Army.
  • It is Department of the Army policy to recognize the rights of copyright owners (for example, photo journalists or embedded media) consistent with the Army’s mission and worldwide commitments. Copyrighted works will not be reproduced or distributed outside of the Army without the written or electronically conveyed permission of the copyright owner.
  • In the event a copyright owner grants the Army written or electronically conveyed permission to use copyrighted material for internal command information or morale and welfare purposes, commanders or heads of Army activities will take care to assure that such permission is not abused by improper use of the material.
  • In addition, any use of copyrighted material, for which permission has been obtained, will carry attribution for the source of the material. Army Public Affairs will continue to make every effort to reinforce this policy through public affairs channels and to ensure widest dissemination of these guidelines around the Army, and at every level of command.
  • Copyrighted material in the Army’s possession should be safeguarded from accidental unauthorized release.
  • Copyright issues are under the purview of the Office of the Judge Advocate General and are covered in Army Regulation 27-60, Intellectual Property.
  • Army Regulation 25-1 prohibits the posting of documents or information protected by a copyright on Army websites without the permission of the copyright holder.
  • Licensed use. A license is a contract which identifies the terms under which we can use a copyrighted work (e.g., can use my painting on the Army website for a period of 6 months, but not for any other purposes). There is no required format for a license and different licenses will vary greatly in their terms. At a minimum, the organization which receives the license should file a record copy. This will vary based on the scope of the license and intended use of the copyrighted work. For example, Office of Chief of Public Affairs might keep track of any licenses which allow use of a copyrighted work on the Army website, but a battalion might keep track of a license to use a copyrighted work in a locally distributed document.