The recent revelations about intelligence leaks in the US involving The Atlantic Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg, who was added to a top-level national security signal chat where war plans were shared, has lifted the lid on the daunting task of keeping sensitive information in the right hands.

Michael Waltz, a national security adviser, inadvertently added Goldberg to the chat that reportedly included Vice President James David Vance and made the journalist privy to discussions about strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen two weeks ago.

In this case, a person who owed his country nothing in protecting sensitive information, having taken no oath of secrecy, sworn by State officials, had access to what would ordinarily be placed under lock and key.