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The parent comment says "any researcher's talk, paper, research, materials, etc. must undergo an export controls review first before it leaves the United States

The parent comment says "any researcher's talk, paper, research, materials, etc. must undergo an export controls review first before it leaves the United States or is shown to a foreign national. This is SOP at every research lab in the United States." My purpose in the comment is to point out that such review is not legally required for public academic research, and there are good constitutional and policy reasons it should not be. Moreover we should be careful about letting the government implement such policies via indirect means. While I'm not in the field of semiconductor research, the export control laws in my field are quite similar (in fact, they're literally the same Federal laws.) And if you read the US code, you'll see that it excludes "[p]ublic domain information which is published and is accessible or available to the public, unrestricted: publications & conferences, patents, fundamental research." These exceptions exist because earlier laws did not have such exceptions and were found (in a case involving cryptography) to be unconstitutional.

nonethewiser 5y ago
Thank you for the context
letsburnthis 5y ago
"[p]ublic domain information which is published and is accessible or available to the public, unrestricted: publications & conferences, patents, fundamental research." That's the definition for what falls under public domain and isn't export controlled, but say you are the one first publishing and bringing it in to the public domain. Would that first publication of something that isn't currently in the public domain fall under the exception?
- matthewdgreen 5y ago
  Yes, that's one exception that seems highly relevant to the current case. Software is another. I'd like to believe that "published research is protected by 1A, but the speech necessary to make new published research is not protected" would go over like a lead balloon in the courts. Notice that these laws haven't been tested: instead prosecutors are going after "grant fraud" (and then dropping all charges before a judge can rule.)

nonethewiser 5y ago

Thank you for the context

letsburnthis 5y ago

"[p]ublic domain information which is published and is accessible or available to the public, unrestricted: publications & conferences, patents, fundamental research." That's the definition for what falls under public domain and isn't export controlled, but say you are the one first publishing and bringing it in to the public domain. Would that first publication of something that isn't currently in the public domain fall under the exception?

matthewdgreen 5y ago
Yes, that's one exception that seems highly relevant to the current case. Software is another. I'd like to believe that "published research is protected by 1A, but the speech necessary to make new published research is not protected" would go over like a lead balloon in the courts. Notice that these laws haven't been tested: instead prosecutors are going after "grant fraud" (and then dropping all charges before a judge can rule.)