Details of the risky way that the U.N. rushed to join the digital universe are not spelled out in the auditors' report, which spanned a decade of U.N. activity and was presented to top officials last October. But in some cases, at least, the breaches may have been-and still may be-sizeable.

In a number of cases, the report says, "minimum security requirements for the development of [U.N.] websites were not defined, and risk assessment, security and encryption procedures were not implemented."

A number of U.N. websites were also apparently developed by external consultants, without proper coordination with the U.N.'s own Office of Information and Communications Technology (OICT), which reports directly to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, and which lists "social networking and collaboration" as one of the major initiatives of its Orwellian-sounding Knowledge Management Program.

Moreover, the report says, service contracts "were not always in place" for internal U.N.