FROM A FRIEND . . . (the joys of boating)

Landon Dyer landon at netcom.com
Thu Sep 21 09:14:13 PDT 1995



>On 21 Sep 1995, Jeff Weinstein wrote:
>>   My understanding is that we can not
>> export our US-only product, except to canada - for the use of canadian
>> citizens.  I also believe that it is illegal for anyone except US citizens,
>> permanent residents of the US (green card holders) and Canadian citizens
>> to use it, even within the US.  I'm not a lawyer, and I've not read
>> all of ITAR myself, so I could be totally wrong...
>
> All the same, if anyone wants an easy and economical
>way to get around ITAR, have someone do your cypto software development 
>just north of the border (Vancouver's just north of Seattle and close 
>enough to Silicon Valley, with excellent net-access) or at least just
>publish it here first.

  here's a possible bullshit wrinkle.  i'm not a lawyer, but one of my
bosses was, once.

  said boss owned a boat that was of canadian registry.  he was a
canadian citizen with a green card.  he *claimed* that, even when
docked in the SF bay area, his boat was technically considered
canadian territory, due to some maritime law malarky.  US authorities
theoretically had to go through various hoops to legally board his
vessel.

  i wouldn't try to halt a SWAT team, or even the local fuzz, with
this tidbit of legal gaga.  but doing crypto development on such a
vessel might hold up in court for something as squishy as ITAR.

  naturally, commuting to canada is probably a *lot* cheaper than
owning a boat.  the uninitiated have little idea what these holes-
in-the-water really cost.... :-)


-landon
  (returning to lurk-mode)







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