Trevor . wrote:
As was commented earlier ITAR certainly does makes it tricky when try to sell something to an American customer who isn't allowed to tell you what they want.
Am I right in thinking the penalty for a US citizen who incorrectly interprets ITAR and inadvertantly breaches it can be a 4 figure fine or jail term ?
No. It is six figures in many cases. I know a tale. I will NOT attest to its veracity since I was not there but I believe it. Somewhere in the world associated with space and military we allowed (a) foreign national(s) to use our facilities to monitor one of their launches as they needed a world wide network for it and we were playing nice. One of their nationals asked "May we put an antenna on that tower and cover this location for our hand held communications for coordination of our activities". The question was answered. The company that employed the person answering the question was fined in excess of $100,000 for answering the question as an ITAR violation because they aided the ground station support for the launch and that was a DEEMED export and not an approved one.
I was once told that it is simply impossible to follow ITAR to the letter and achieve any purpose. What you do is negotiate a document of exceptions and reporting and call it a technical assistance agreement. Once that is approved you are allowed to communicate but heaven help you even if you inadvertently exceed the authority of that document. I just cannot afford personally to take such risks especially after making a full mea culpa on those things which were done wrong before and being told "do not do this again or it will be tougher".
I infer from previous comments on this list that ITAR also prevents detailed discussion of an amateur satellite via an email list that is open to non-US citizens and might also impact on a Wiki or articles written by US Nationals in publications such as the AMSAT Journal.
73 Trevor M5AKA
One can only hope there is some sanity turned on amateur radio spacecraft in particular some day since we are not-for-profit and have education and international comity as our goals.
Bob N4HY