Research Security Office

Description of the video:

All right everyone um thank you for coming today and I want to first of all thank the research administrator team for letting us um come here and chat with you guys today about export control so thank you research administrator team my name is Kathryn Klokker I'm the director of the export control program here and I will be giving a presentation on export control and how it affects the university. I know you have all probably been dying to hear about this topic but I think it is just after 10 so I will start presenting in just one second. Let me share my points. Can everyone see my screen, Collin? Can you see my screen? I can. Great. Okay. Thank you everyone again for joining us. And again, thank you to the research administrator team. So today we're here to talk about export control and how it impacts our university here at Indiana. And feel free to type questions as I go. I will leave some time at the end to address some questions, or if you want to wait until the end to ask your questions, you're welcome to do so. But I'll just go through this, and then at the end, I'll take any questions you might have. So welcome. I'm part of the Research Security Office. Collin Rich, he is also here. He's the Chief Research Security Officer. And let's hear about export control. So this presentation is tailored towards you as research administrators and maybe finance people here at the university, procurement officers. And how does export control really touch our university? So export control laws are aimed at protecting our national security, our economic interests, it is to promote foreign policy and also to protect human rights. So you might be kind of thinking export control, I'm not sure exactly, you know, this is sort of a sounds like a vague word, a vague term. How does this really have anything to do with what we do here at IU. Well, export control regulations regulate the shipment. So physical shipping is something you might think of when you hear the word export. So they regulate the physical shipment. They also regulate the transfer or disclosure of information that is related to controlled items, right? So you can have a controlled item. So a physical thing that you ship and it might need a license to do so you can have technical data or technology so information about that controlled item you could have controlled software and additionally some activities are controlled right so there are a variety of things um that export control can be related to in the university context um just you know a quick overview is that there are three main federal regulators related to export controls. You've got the Department of State, you've got the Department of Commerce, and you've got OFAC. So we've got state and commerce have lists of items and information related to those items that are controlled. And then OFAC, the Department of Treasury, has mainly sanctions. So you will see like sanctions against countries, some big ones you might have seen recently. Russia, North Korea, obviously. And so these are the big regulators we're talking about when we think about export control. There are a few others that also touch export control, but these are the main three. The U.S. government controls exports of sensitive equipment, software, and technology as a means to promote our national security interests and foreign policy objectives. So you at IU here, you know, we participate in a lot of cutting-edge research, right? And sometimes this research, you might know, is funded by the government and might have export control concerns. So there are two ways, really, that you can export something. Like I mentioned earlier, you might have an item. You might be physically exporting something, so shipping or otherwise transporting an item to a foreign person or a foreign country. So someone who is not a U.S. citizen, a green card holder, or other protected person like an asylee or refugee. So if you ship something in the mail and it's controlled and you're shipping it to a foreign country, it might need a license. If you are going to another country with controlled information on your computer, or maybe your computer itself is controlled, and you take it through customs, and you take it to the other country, that is also an example of an export. A deemed export is a transfer of the information about the item that is controlled to a foreign person. So that could happen right here in the United States. It could happen at our university. So if you are working with some controlled technology and you disclose some of the information about it as controlled, even just orally, that could also be an export and it could require a license in some scenarios. So an example could be emailing some software that's controlled or, you know, looking at blueprints that are required for the design of certain controlled items. these are really some we've got six sort of main areas of impact for the university we've got research as i mentioned of course iu you know we've got some really cutting-edge research so research using controlled technology um sometimes on behalf of the government or a defense contractor um and research in emerging technologies um can frequently have export considerations. We've got, you know, the largest medical school. We've got some supercomputing capabilities. We've got lots of research that sort of touches on things that may be export controlled. Travel. Obviously, at the university, people will travel. People travel for work. People travel for personal reasons. Like I mentioned, hand carrying things through custom, even through customs, even like a laptop, could carry an export consideration, right? Obviously, this depends on where you're going and what you're taking, but that's another way it touches our lives here at IU. Contracts is another area where export control can be concerned. So, contracts that include certain clauses that might restrict open publication, contracts with the government that have certain slowdowns, contracts that are for certain controlled technologies or with foreign partners, these are all things that can bring an export control review related to a contract on campus. Shipping, so physically shipping controlled items, maybe shipping lab equipment, shipping vaccines, shipping nuclear material, this frequently will require a license, right, especially if you're shipping to a foreign country. Procurement, so purchasing controlled equipment, and then of course screening partners for inclusion on certain government lists. Payments to certain vendors, especially in, you know, sanctioned countries can cause export control considerations. And then partnerships, so international partnerships, especially that involve what are, you know, considered countries of concern can carry export control considerations. There are some countries that have entities on government lists, and some countries have more of these entities included than other countries. So international research collaboration on controlled technology or controlled, not public information might require a license to do this sort of collaboration. So, really, export control regulations, they can impact, obviously, people, organizations, our university, it impacts places, so countries where you might travel, shipping things, bringing things, other activities, and then also things, so items, data, materials, chemicals, equipment, software, and even research. So, our office, if you are going to be collaborating internationally, our office is always happy to conduct a risk assessment before doing so. When you are collaborating with someone who is not in the U.S. and you're collaborating especially on something that might be considered a sensitive area of research, it is always best to contact our office before entering into this sort of research collaboration. We also can, you know, run screenings on people. Another thing that, you know, can cause export concerns is, you know, if you're providing services, visiting scholars coming to IU, soliciting donations from abroad. So, our screening software that we have here at the university called visual compliance will screen for all of these, you know, government lists that people could be included on. In procurement, your system already is integrated with visual compliance. So it will flag if you put in a new person and it is on one of these lists, visual compliance automatically will tell you that. But if you are a researcher or you work with researchers who want to partner with people in other countries, especially ones that might be heavily sanctioned or might be a quote-unquote country of concern, our office is always happy to look at that collaboration before it happens to make sure you don't need any other authorizations to do that collaboration safely. Like I said, this also impacts just, you know, regions in general. So I've got a couple of places listed up here on the slide. These are some major players that, you know, will likely require federal authorization to do activities with. This can include conferences that are even virtual. It obviously includes research. It could include publications, payments, and even remote or online classwork. So if there are some prohibitions, for example, for students studying in certain countries, even if they're, you know, studying remotely and they're taking in IU classes, there are certain instances in which that can require a license from the government to do so. international travel we I personally love to travel um and I know that our university does a lot of incredible collaboration a lot of work travel um it's always a best practice to travel with clean devices that's just a general you know best practice but if you are going to be traveling abroad especially to um countries of concern uh we would always recommend that you limit your presentations and discussions and the information on your laptop to, you know, published information and just general system software. And if you're going to be taking lab equipment or taking items on campus to that other country, we request that you come to our office first to make sure you don't need an exemption or a license to take that to another country, right? If you get requests to, you know, tour facilities or if they want you to provide consulting or training or any type of assistance or to transfer unpublished research data or to just even discuss or disclose it, please, of course, share that information with us. Because again, all of these things could possibly require a license. Of course, there are so many things you can do abroad that don't require a license from the government, but there are, especially with regard to sensitive research or countries that are concerning for the U.S. federal government, there are reasons why certain activities and certain, you know, topics might require a license. Our favorite thing, shipment. So when you think of an export, you probably think, you know, shipping something, right? So, this also comes with a variety of export considerations. If you're shipping a controlled item, it might require a license. There are instances in which an item might not require a license to certain countries, and it does require a license for other countries. So, like it says here on the slide, there are different considerations, different levels of control for you know the destination the end use the end user and there are certain labeling due diligence and documentation requirements when you are going to ship something so if you are you know part of an international research collaboration and your partner requests that you ship some type of lab equipment to their lab in Italy for example that is something we would request that you come to our office and ask us about first, just to make sure that we don't need a license prior to shipping that. So you might all kind of be wondering why is the research administrator team talking to us about export control? Well, I really like talking, and I like talking about export control, but last year, IU and the Bureau of Industry and Security, so the Commerce Department entered into a settlement agreement because the Bloomington Drosophilia Stock Center exported genetically modified fruit flies that had the ricin A subunit to different research institutions that were in different countries without the appropriate export licenses. So this settlement came after IU discovered that these were an export violation and then disclosed that information to the Department of Commerce. So IU discovered that this happened, did a disclosure, and then when that happens, then we entered into an agreement with CIS to do a few things, right? So I just want to point out that BDFC, they did take the appropriate steps. They consulted with the compliance offices before shipping these flies, but unfortunately, the export regulations were not flagged at that moment, and it was only discovered after the fact that there needed to be an export authorization in order to make these shipments. So, requirements from the settlement included these things, and as you can see in red here, we have to provide export compliance training on, you know, these export regulations to administrators at the university. I like to always say that export compliance is a team sport, right? So the more people that know about it, the more people can spread the word about our function here at the university and the research security office. So I'm sure you will see me again because I love to talk about export control, but we are here specifically today because of our settlement with the Department of Commerce. We did not have a monetary penalty because we disclosed the violations and we cooperated with the Department of Commerce and we are implementing remedial measures, which includes this training. And this case sort of just underscores that even things that you might not think of, like, hey, why would I need a license to ship a fly, right? This just sort of shows that there are lots of things to think about when it comes to export control and export control can touch a lot of things. So like in this example, HHS had relevant regulations relating to these types of flies, right? And HHS did not control these flies, but the export regulations did. And so this just comes to show that, like, you even have to just do extra due diligence to make sure, even when just domestic regulations don't apply, that there isn't some sort of export control concern as well. So, the other area that sort of is all-encompassing of export control is what? So, items, software, technology materials information so if you are a procurement officer and um you know someone asks you to buy something and they said hey i want to buy these night vision goggles right um if it's something that has a you know a military application if it's something that has a space application if it's a particularly, you know, scary bacteria or toxin or vaccine. This is just something that might be an export red flag, right? If the person you're purchasing the item from requests an end use or end user statement, that's another flag that maybe the export control office needs to know what's being purchased and what is on campus, right? These are some commonly controlled items, and these are some items that could be controlled at very different levels depending on their capabilities, right? So something on campus that is ubiquitous, right? Integrated circuits. That could range anywhere from state departments to the higher level control. It could be on the commerce control list with sort of a mid-level control all the way down to the lowest level of control, not listed on the commerce control list, which would be EAR-99. Same thing with the vaccines. There are certain vaccines that are controlled at this very high state department level. Some, you know, sort of in this commerce control list level and some that might be EAR-99. same thing goes with something like night vision goggles uh high energy cells so um these could be used in different maybe energy or space applications um space technologies are another thing that can have these different levels of control and another thing that is you know we probably see drones on a weekly basis right drones uavs so these can again range from a really high level of control to you know a really low level of control um so these are just some things to think about that you know to apply export control in your daily life um you know even even my cell phone even this computer I'm presenting on um can be controlled to certain destinations right so this is just a list of some critical and emerging technology another list that sort of just, you know, should ring a little bell in your brain. If you see maybe a contract relating to this type of research, if you are procuring something related to these types of technologies, these are some areas that might just cause you to pause for a second and say, hey, maybe I should ask the export control people about this. And I will emphasize again, we are happy to get your questions. We are happy to screen people. We are happy to do risk assessments. We are just happy to talk to anyone at the university in general. So never hesitate to reach out to us in any situation. This is just, I think, a nice visual of how to understand research as it relates to export control. So I mentioned that, you know, certain research topics could be controlled, right? So if we've got a contract with a defense contractor to build something for a military platform, this is just a very obvious example, right? So we've got a research contract and they want us to build something that is, you know, on this list for the State Department, right? That would fall down here into the yellow orange area of ITAR, Right. And so if you are just working on this with U.S. persons, so citizens, green card holders, asylees, refugees, you don't need a license, but you do need to control that technology to make sure that other people cannot access it. right? This also doesn't mean that you can't do this research with maybe a grad student from another country. You just need to contact our office because we will need to put a control plan in place and we will also need to probably get a license for that person who is not a U.S. person, right? So this shows sort of the, not a timeline, but sort of the range of research that we can have on campus, ranging from fundamental research, so no controls, it is open, and anyone can participate all the way out to, of course, classified research. But there are just, there are many stops along the way, and when you've got even some of the dual-use research, there are cases in which you might need a technology control plan in order to control, you know, access for foreign persons to that information. Like I said earlier, um, export controls, uh, it's, it's something that's shared, right? Like we can't, I can't just do export control by myself. If I don't know what's going on, I don't know, you know, what, what needs to have some sort of plan. I don't know how to help you protect it. And I don't know how to help you participate in research or procure things or review contracts. So again, export controls are a shared thing. I would love you to share the news with anyone you know related to export control. That is my ultimate goal and dream is to have everyone contacting me. Maybe not everyone, but we do want you to contact us if you have a question about export control because it does touch many areas on our campus. And then finally, we have now a listserv. So if you want to stay up to date with export control topics, if you, you know, just want to keep in contact with our office, these are three ways you can subscribe to our listserv. The second and third way, I will let you know that when you subscribe, you will have to actively click a link in your email to confirm that you subscribed. But the first way, we'll automatically subscribe you. So I'll leave this up for just a second. And of course, we'll provide this after the presentation as well. But we would be happy if you subscribe to our listserv and we won't bombard you because then I would have to, you know, produce content all the time. But we will send you important updates and maybe interesting things about export control and research security in general and i just want to thank you for joining us today um as i said I'm Kathryn I'm the director and i've also got my friend jim who is here watching as well but you can contact either of us or you can contact our general inbox which is export at iu.edu with any questions you might ever have as it relates to export control. And thank you guys so much. If you have any questions, I'm going to look at the Q&A and I will address some of these. Okay, I've got a question here that says, would you please define level of control a little bit more? Yes, I would be happy to. So I think this might have been before my level of control slide, but that's all right. I'll just, you know, quickly sort of go over it. I know at the beginning, we talked about the different regulators, right? And in the context of export control, there are two main lists. There's the United States munitions list, and there's the commerce control list. As you could probably tell by the name munitions, that would have usually a higher level of control and more license requirements. And we've also got the commerce control list, which is under the Department of Commerce, right? And so things that are on the USML are usually related to space or the military and have a higher level of control. Things that are on the commerce control list, which ranges from my cell phone to different space technologies to microelectronics, have different levels of control, you know, depending on where they are on this commerce control list. So when I'm talking about levels of control, I'm talking about these lists and I'm also talking about um it could be maybe federal contract restrictions related to how you do research um and i hope that addresses your question but if not please um you can comment in the chat we've got another comment here um can you explain what a clean device is so yeah so a clean device would be you know uh a computer with basic operating software on it or um you know the colloquial colloquial phrase burner phone right so something that is not you know your device with all of your research information or special software installed um it's just a best practice you know when you're traveling to travel with these devices just in case um you know there are certain countries that might um in customs look at your devices um it's also obviously it's possible here in the U.S., right, for, you know, Customs and Border Patrol to look at your research information, to look at what's on your device. So, it's just, it's a good practice to travel with a clean device in general, but for export control reasons, if you have controlled research and you're taking it to another country, that could be at risk for an export control violation. um will the slides be sent out yes we will send out these slides um I'm happy to share these slides and we're also happy to share a recording thank you Collin for saying that and i think that is all of the questions i see here in the chat but if you have other questions oh new post sorry um is this being provided to the researchers good question um we always uh try to do outreach and i am trying to do more outreach to researchers we have some researchers who are absolutely well versed in export control they work with control technologies they have technology control plans and they know about this but then of course you know there are other people that may not have worked on an export-controlled project before and might not know. So yes, we always, you know, try and liaise with the researchers, but we like to have everyone on campus educated. So if maybe a researcher comes to you, you can point them to our office. Maybe it's someone who hasn't been able to attend, or maybe someone who's a new researcher and isn't aware. But yes, we always try to work with our researchers on campus, and we work with a lot of researchers who do export-controlled work Collin did i miss anything here i don't i don't think so uh looks like we got all the questions i tried to ping back at some of them but i think you've gotten i think you've gotten all of them um thank you for the uh for the overview of export control and i hope that that was helpful we've uh to our team assembled here, we were getting really close to almost 200 attendees. And so I can't thank everyone enough for joining and being part of this. And just to reiterate what Kathryn said, we are striving to be a resource to our researchers and to our colleagues within the administrative spaces of the university. So please feel free to reach out to us either directly or at our general inbox any time we can be of assistance to you or to our faculty. Absolutely. And if you have any more questions, you know, please feel free to follow up via email. You can Teams us, anything that, you know, makes you feel comfortable, please follow up with questions. And I just want to apologize. I think my camera might not have been on. I just realized that. But I'm here. I'm a person and um thank you so much for uh joining my presentation today thanks everyone we'll see you guys later thank you so much.