Have you ever accidentally sent a text, a direct message, or an email to the wrong person? Who among us hasn’t? It’s a common mistake that often isn’t too big of a deal but can lead to some serious gaffes depending on the nature of the content. However, it’s easy to see how such issues with sensitive military email messages can cause serious ramifications and threats to national defense as a result. Unfortunately, the U.S. military has an issue with accidentally sending emails to the country of Mali rather than within its own ranks. Additionally, it’s worth noting that America isn’t the only country having the same issue. Since the leak has been identified and fixed, no major disclosures have arisen that suggest this has caused any real problems for national security just yet. Related read: Discord Leaks Over Ukraine Continue to Puzzle Officials, Air National Guardsman Arrested

How to Access Military Email

Military email can be as mundane as the messages in your workplace you ignore, contain some quite sensitive information, or anything in between. If you’re in the American Armed Forces, here’s how to safely log into military email:

• You’ll need to access military email using either Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge browsers only.
• On the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) login portal, you’ll select your branch to log into your military email account.
• Using your username and password, you can access your account. If you don’t know your password, the DoD has an online site for recovering your account.
• However, you must enter your Common Access Card (CAC) pin to prove that you are allowed to access your account.

It’s worth noting that Google has improved its security features. As a result, there are some troops that may have Gmail accounts rather than OWA military email accounts. However, logging into military email isn’t at the heart of a potential security risk popping up in Africa. It’s a very simple mistake that anyone could make. This is because .MIL is awfully close to .ML. Suggested read: African Leaders Call for Peace and Ukraine Wheat

An Email Typo is Causing Concern for the U.S.

If you aren’t aware, not everyone uses .COM when looking for a webpage. Each country has its own domain code and while the United States has the most popular, .ML is the code used in the West African country of Mali. For reference, .MIL is the code used by the U.S. military. As you can see, it’s not too farfetched to understand where the issue lies. Reports by the Financial Times have found that millions of emails have been sent to Mali rather than their rightful recipients within the U.S. military. Some contain sensitive information and regardless, this blight could pose a security risk. Examples of the information leaked include:

• Passwords
• Medical information
• Tax returns and financial information
• Diplomatic documents
• The travel arrangements of top-level officials

Thankfully, none of the information leaked was classified and the DoD is looking into the issue. As Russia and Mali have developed quite a relationship over the years, the potential for mistakes is even more concerning. It’s commonplace for countries to spy on one another and with tensions in Europe refusing to simmer down, these efforts are amplified. On average, well over a thousand cyber-attacks are dealt with by the DoD per year. Having information floating around is also opening up new doors and adding to access points where enemies of the United States might gain access. While it may not fix the problem to mention this, it should be noted that the U.S. isn’t the only nation making this snafu.

Accidentally Leaking Military Email to Mali isn’t Just an American Problem

It makes perfect sense that Dutch entrepreneur Johannes Zuurbier, who is managing Mali’s domain, would find the leak. Zuurbier notified the proper authorities of the issue. Why does this make sense? Because his country is accidentally doing the same thing. Leaking emails is an issue for many organizations and governments, and the U.S. is no exception, but it's also keeping the company of the Netherlands which has fallen to the same sort of typo leaks involving Mali. Instead of sending emails to its army.nl, the same typo was made, and off to Mali the Dutch military secrets went. What is concerning, however, is that Zuurbier has been trying to alert the Pentagon to the issue for ten years. You’d think the DoD would have been a bit timelier in taking notice. Nevertheless, the military email leak to Mali is a constant reminder of the importance of protecting sensitive information while on the Internet and double-checking our spell check before sending messages of any kind. Read next: The Complicated Necessity of (Redacted) Documents in the Military