Hugh Pickens writes "Retired University of Tennessee Professor Dr. John Reece Roth has been sentenced to four years in prison after he allowed a Chinese graduate student to see sensitive information on Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs), also known as drones. In 2004, the company Roth helped found, Atmospheric Glow Technologies, won a US Air Force contract to develop a plasma actuator that could help reduce drag on the wings of drones, such as the ones the military uses. Under the contract, for which Roth was reportedly paid $6,000, he was prohibited from sharing sensitive data with foreign nationals. Despite warnings from his university's Export Control Officer, in 2006, Roth took a laptop containing sensitive plans with him on a lecture tour in China and also allowed graduate students Xin Dai of China and Sirous Nourgostar of Iran to work on the project. 'The illegal export of restricted military data represents a serious threat to national security,' says David Kris of the US Department of Justice. 'We know that foreign governments are actively seeking this information for their own military development. Today's sentence should serve as a warning to anyone who knowingly discloses restricted military data in violation of our laws.' During his trial, Roth testified that he was unaware that hiring the graduate students was a violation of his contract. 'This whole thing has not helped me, it has not helped the university,' said Roth. 'And it has probably not helped this country, either.'"
He knew he wasn't supposed to do it, he was warned not to do it, he did it anyway. He pled guilty.
If he didn't read his contract that's his problem. I also find it very unlikely.
Why is this on slashdot?
Possibly to serve as a warning to others? That might be his whole purpose in life.
Because it's another crybaby story the govt. is evil, copyright is evil, and all nerds should be allowed free access to any information that is in the entire world. I'm surprised they didn't try to tie the iphone and google into it.
Why would anyone smart enough to get a Ph.D. even suspect that, after working on classified information, he shouldn't disclose that information to a student hand-selected to study with him by a totalitarian government with a history of using its military to take over others, repress dissent, and threaten other nations?
If he didn't read his contract that's his problem. I also find it very unlikely.
Agreed. ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) is something that all defense workers are trained in. It's also explained very carefully that if there's a violation it's not the government program's fault, it's not the company's fault, but it's the employee that's going to prison. It's a pretty strict standard. Even discussing things in the public domain for the wrong purposes can land you in hot water-- giving a citation (book name, page number) of public domain information can violate ITAR if it's in response to, say, a question about missile technology. In essence what you exported there was your expertise in leading the foreign national to that source of information.
Incidentally, these are the same regulations that kept the old PowerMac G4's from being exported and led to the "tank" commercial at the time.
In essence what you exported there was your expertise in leading the foreign national to that source of information.
I'd like to add to this, because many people here on/. who don't have experience in these areas often ask, "Why is it illegal for a member of the military/Boeing employee/Raytheon employee/etc to say publicly what can already be found easily on wikipedia or other sources?"
The answer is: Because it verifies facts. An article by AP about the air force's new musical ice-cream truck UAV could only be written based on publicly-available facts or deduction. Once a member of the Air Force confirms to the press or anyone else that yes, we have a new ice-cream UAV and it is delicious, the subject is confirmed. Every member of the DoD, DoD contractors, and DoD researchers is like a walking snopes.com in that everything they say is scrutinized and accepted as the acting ultimate authority on the subject.
Here's a real world example based on my own experiences. There are maps online of a certain base in Iraq that give very detailed, very accurate information. You can find it, but I won't tell you which one it is. OK. But when we do our predeployment briefing to that base, and which uses *that map*, and which is given by Intel and is secret/noforn- ALL cell phones go away, all the doors are closed, and all the window blinds are closed. The fact that we are using that map as a fact... Makes that map a *Fact*. Capital "F".
See?
I realize that's at odds with much of what slashdottery stands for, but when lives are on the line secrecy matters. It may seem silly but it matters enough to people in the loop (like me...) to keep certain things under wraps.
Another real-world example: My base public relations officer called me in Iraq (from the U.S.) to talk to me about my blog (which was about my deployment). He cautioned me, in no uncertain terms, to be "very, very careful what I include in my essays." And this was after I took pains to change names, places, times, patterns, etc so that my account could easily be from any shitty place* in the world if you didn't personally know where I was.
-b
*No offense Iraq, it was just the weather. No really.
Those of us who work in defense are trained until we're blue in the face about how to handle sensitive information, what is and is not releasable, and what an "export" is in defense terms (it's more than it sounds). My company trains us extensively on that, and maybe the company he founded didn't bother to pound these things into the heads of the people in the company, but it's just not a good excuse. If we are to be trusted to handle classified information, it's up to us to make sure we understand proper
Those of us who work in defense are trained until we're blue in the face about how to handle sensitive information, what is and is not releasable
He doesn't work in "defense", he's a retired University professor who works for a company doing work with plasma. Comparing him to yourself is disingenuous at best.
Universities (especially physics) works very differently than a company with regard to "classified" information. Here's how it works. You want research money. You apply for a grant from the DOE for said research money where you check "yes this has potential weapons applications" (because hey, what doesn't?). The DOE grants your request. In reality your research only meets the barest minimum for a qualification of "weapons potential". Yah, there's some kind of nonsense restriction on what you can do with it, but remember it never really had defense implications in the first place.
So, if we're talking about environments here, that's quite a different environment than the one you're describing.
He doesn't work in "defense", he's a retired University professor who works for a company doing work with plasma. Comparing him to yourself is disingenuous at best.
Okay. I work for a university and the government working in a similar field as the professor in question. I'm familiar with the ITAR regulations, and I sign agreements to not disclose this kind of information. I'm strictly science, yet I still have to use aircraft and spacecraft that are dual purposed. I know exactly the rules he had to follow...
Universities (especially physics) works very differently than a company with regard to "classified" information.
Nope. I'm held to the same standards as my civil servant colleagues. I even have to take the same training sessions. We don't call it FIOS, or SECRET but the acronyms we use have same meanings associated with them.
Yah, there's some kind of nonsense restriction on what you can do with it, but remember it never really had defense implications in the first place.
The trouble with your argument is that the UAV in question is a UAV that is similar to the one used in defense, but assigned a civilian task. The information that he provided did compromise security.
So, if we're talking about environments here, that's quite a different environment than the one you're describing.
Different? Yes. Different enough? No. I have projects that allow non-US grad students and I have projects that don't...
And this is how ITAR is damaging to our national security. As the DOE and DOD are major funding agencies at universities and national labs, we are now creating a research system that prevents foreign nationals from participating. And since they are a large percentage of our grad students, that's a major problem. It subsequently makes the US a less enticing place for the skilled students we'd like to immigrate here.
Since he seems to have been convicted under the EAR, which is a set of regulations having to do with rendering technical aid to foreigners, and not the ITAR, which is a set of regulations about exporting actual objects (such as munitions or rocket-control thingies), there is very close parsing required of the law to figure out what is Right or not.
After all, the material he distributed wasn't classified, and in principle the 1st Amendment to the U.S. constitution allows you to say whatever you want to whomever you want (provided that you aren't directly inciting a crime, or lying, or distributing classified information). It's especially interesting because most violations of the EAR never get to trial -- they are generally settled by defense contractors who are eager to make good so that the flow of federal dollars doesn't dry up -- so this is likely to be a strong legal precedent. In this case, as in so many, my guess is that he had the standard language in his federal contract -- essentially "I agree to abide by ITAR and EAR" -- so that the regulations can be enforced via contract law even if the ITAR and EAR are eventually found to be unconstitutional if applied to general citizens.
The most scary situation involving EAR/ITRAR is that I know of no legal precedent at all for the EAR in the case of a gifted, privately funded enthusiast just screwing around -- but it applies to many things that even hobbyists do now. If you take an interest in (say) cheap image stabilization systems or inertial guidance of vehicles, and share your work with some of your friends down at the rocket club (who happen to be exchange students from the Pacific Rim), the regulations say that you are liable for millions of dollars in fines and many years of jail time -- even though those technologies are well within the range of gifted college students today (and affordable for an enthusiast to tinker with). I have no idea what the outcome of such a case would be -- only that the legal bills would be immense and the hypothetical hobbyist's life would be put on hold for years, if the Feds decided to take an interest.
I do truck with signing a contract that lays out very explicitly what obligations and restrictions to which you you are voluntarily agreeing. He knew (or absolutely should have known) that when you sign a contract to consult for the DOD, you are accepting these restrictions.
This is about as much YRO (which has meant YR for a long time now anyway) as any other mundane contractual disputes that turn up.
Contractual or not, four years for sharing some plans seems tad excessive.
Oh well. I guess you have to be American to understand the American judicial system.
What? My goodness, that anti-American commentary is become less and less rational on a daily basis.
Look, there's a lot of technology that could be used to kill a lot of people if the wrong hands get access to it. The American taxpayer paid for that R&D, and it should be used in our interests, not to aid an inimical foreign power like China (no, they're not our friends, and probably never will be.) I understand that you're just trying to get in a jab at the hated Americans, but ask yourself how the Russians, or the Iranians, or the Israelis, or the Chinese or... well, pretty much ANY country that has made a significant investment in military technology would (and have) handled similar cases. Compared to some of those countries, this is a slap on the wrist. I mean, after all the agreements he signed, just taking that laptop to CHINA, of all places, should have earned him a lot more than four years. I suspect the Feds cut him some slack.
I'm sorry that you're ignorant of such matters, but you know, that is a curable condition.
Contractual or not, four years for sharing some plans seems tad excessive.
I'm not an American, and I think that four years for a very real leak of sensitive military information is quite mild, and only shows to point out the difference between U.S. (and other Western countries), and, say, China - consider what would happen to a Chinese professor in a similar situation.
by Anonymous Coward
on Friday July 03, @03:49PM (#28574977)
Let's see, he signed a contract saying he was prohibited from sharing sensitive data with foreign nationals, then he shared it with forign nationals. Now he says "he was unaware that hiring the graduate students (to do work in the project) was a violation of his contract"? He's either too stupid to be a professor, or he's lying.
He made a poor choice, for sure, but a lot of academics live and work in a 'publish freely, collaborate frequently' mind-set that helps share knowledge and advance human understanding. The whole culture of scientific openness, testability and peer review is strongly at odds with the secrecy-is-paramount function of military endeavours. The two must work together if militaries are to benefit from the latest scientific knowledge but the goals of academics and military are not the same and I'm not surprised it leads to such mistakes.
I'm a university UAV researcher myself; I know lots of folks who work with the military to get funding to do research they think is important. It comes with the territory, and most of us are pretty cluey about the defense applications of what we do. I have been to plenty of conferences where the guys from Iran and China are presenting trivial results or not bothering to present at all, only to attend every potentially valuable seminar they can. We know they're trying to use our stuff, they know they're trying to use our stuff, but we feel that sharing knowledge and putting it out there is crucial for the science.
For that reason people are careful about the alliances they make with the military. Working on national security stuff generally means you can't publish anything valuable you come up. I know a few collegues well who can't say what they did between years X and Y when they go for a job interview - it can be kryptonite to your career.
I don't think this guy was necessarily stupid or foolish - I think he was careless after being so used to the routine of publish or perish that he forgot who his collaborators were, and that was his mistake.
I simply don't buy into any arguments presented thus far, for defending a lighter sentence.
I'm the absent-minded type. From experience, I can assure people that the sheer number of security briefings, security awareness tests and periodioc recertifications and signed contracts makes it so even the dumbest idiot can't claim they weren't aware. And yeah, it's corny or awkward as it is to say "I've agreed not to discuss it" to a loved one or potential employer.
With experience, you learn to deflect the "but surely you trust me, don't you?" with "I trust you and think you deserve to know. However, that is not the issue. I gave a solemn promise and feel an ethical duty to make my word mean something. Please don't continue to put me in awkward situations or I will start to think less of you."
The interview process in my own company involves and ethics/honor test that asks the applicant about classified work and if they start to give details, they're not invited back. Who wants to hire dishonorable people to work next to them? Not me.
As far as employment, you can get validation that you were legitimately employed and others in the reseach/tech/engineering industry are used to dealing with it. All classified programs will have an associated FSO (Facility Security Officer) that can provide you process guidance and that persons name and contact info is made clear in the security training and if anyone legitimately wants help with this, drop me a line and I'll do my best.
From experience, the real issue is lack of maturity and strong personal sense of ethics.
The punishment will serve it's purpose well.
You do not share state secrets, even if your intentions are innocent. You do not treat them so lightly as to absent mindedly give them out. This is an incredibly important message for the government to send out. If you send out a message of "oh you silly sausage, I'll let it go this time" you'll have leaks left right and center. It doesn't matter how innocous the person you're revealing it to seems. Spies go out their ways to be innocuous, or will try to get information from people you've told (which is even worse as it makes the spies much harder to identify).
Giving out military secrets costs lives. Freedom of information is all well and good until people then use that information too kill (not just in warfare but innocent civilians, political opponents etc.)
by Anonymous Coward
on Friday July 03, @03:54PM (#28575013)
You can't work on a top-secret project without signing very serious agreements with Uncle Sam. It just doesn't happen. Therefore he knew damned well he wasn't allowed to share this information, but did so anyway. What the fuck did he expect? What the fuck would *you* expect? If you expected to get away with something like that without consequence, you're a fucking moron.
by Anonymous Coward
on Friday July 03, @03:58PM (#28575049)
I'm not entirely surprised by either the sentence, or the seeming lack of security consciousness on the part of the professor and possibly his school. When working on defense-related work it's always best to treat sensitive material with the respect it deserves - in many cases there's no need to go overboard with encryption, physical security, or whatnot, but reasonable measures (e.g., not bringing the Goddamned laptop overseas) should always be taken.
However, from what I heard, the project Dr. Roth was working on wasn't entirely black-ops sort of stuff - he was merely integrating technology previously developed by himself (and others) under funding not remotely related to defense.
"Openness", both ideologically and in the FOSS sense, forms one of the core requirements of
successful academia.
I don't blame or absolve the professor - He had a contract, and I suppose the legal details
of this boil down to a matter of contract law (though I most certainly do have a problem
with prison time rather than monetary damages for breach of contract). But I do blame
both his university and the government itself.
I blame the university for undermining any sense of credibility by selling out to the highest
bidder at the expense of discrimination against an arbitrary list of students - Students who paid
the same tuition as every other student, yet cannot experience the same intellectual freedoms as
their peers all because some magic list-of-the-week says their Fearless Leader (whom in many cases
they came to the US because they don't like the policies or education climate back home) pissed
in our Cheerios.
And I blame the government for foisting their homework onto a domain that largely considers
secrecy either beneath consideration or outright contemptible. Don't want foreign students to
have access to military projects? Simple - Give those projects to standard military-industrial
contractors familiar with paranoid levels of obfuscation and mistrust such as Lockheed, Grumman,
Boeing or the like. And if they do decide to tap academia for parts of their research,
I blame them for not taking care to prevent any one group from having "enough" information to
do anything useful with.
You don't spank a baby for giggling at butterflies, and you don't hold it accountable if you
give it a gun and someone gets hurt. Simple as that.
at the expense of discrimination against an arbitrary list of students - Students who paid the same tuition as every other student, yet cannot experience the same intellectual freedoms as their peers all because some magic list-of-the-week says their Fearless Leader (whom in many cases they came to the US because they don't like the policies or education climate back home) pissed in our Cheerios.
'Hate to pull you down from your clouds, but you are way off. First of all, none of these graduate students, at least in physical sciences, actually "pay tuition". Usually in one way (working as teaching assistant or research assistant) or another (grants and fellowships), they will not only attend the school tuition-free, they will also get paid living expenses. I should know, I'm one of these graduate students (although not an international one).
In fact, if it's a public institution, these foreign graduat
Students who paid the same tuition as every other student, yet cannot experience the same intellectual freedoms as their peers all because some magic list-of-the-week says their Fearless Leader (whom in many cases they came to the US because they don't like the policies or education climate back home) pissed in our Cheerios.
Actually, ITAR regulations require that no foreign nationals work on the project -- not just ones from countries like China and Iran. Many universities (or individual professors) do actually reject any ITAR projects, since it places significant restrictions on them and their students.
Forget the prison sentence, I want to learn about the "plasma actuator that could help reduce drag on the wings of drones". (This is a tech site, remember?) So, how do these work?
by Anonymous Coward
on Friday July 03, @04:10PM (#28575143)
OK, so I'm in Canada, and everyone knows that Canadians are slackers when it comes to security (sarcasm for the humor challenged).
The prof had to be ignoring the rules deliberately. The paperwork I had to sign required the details of every student working on the project. They didn't have to be security cleared but they sure did have to be Canadian or American. There was no chance to skip over that clause in the contract; a security guy read it to me out loud and made damn sure I understood what it meant.
by Anonymous Coward
on Friday July 03, @04:21PM (#28575227)
A big problem/bug/feature of American academic engineering research groups is that the graduate students and post-docs are predominantly foreign, typically from China and India. American citizens with advanced engineering degrees are a dying breed - Americans don't (in general) aspire to get PhDs in engineering.
So if you are soliciting proposals to American universities for defense-related research, be warned that whomever is doing the research (even if they themselves are citizens and cleared) are likely doing that research in a room full of foreign nationals.
...and a bunch of other good articles listed after it.
Does the DOD think they not have the Internet in China and Iran?
Just by reading this article, you can get a good sense of the concept, which has to do with creating high-speed, non-mechanical aircraft control surfaces via boundary layer manipulation. Is this really that big of a secret?
I'll post more on this after I investigate the thump on the roof and see who's at the front door.
The reason for classifying it is that, without the DoD's extra work, it's difficult to know which ideas really work. There are lots of ideas coming out of academia that look great on paper but won't actually work due to engineering limitations or overlooked variables. If you know which are worth investigating further (because someone else has already done the feasibility analysis) then your R&D costs are much lower. Considering the fact that modern war basically boils down to economics, it's a legitimate concern.
What the hell kind of contract with the DoD is only $6K? The cost of a security clearance for one person is at least $40K. Maybe it was one stage of a multi-stage contract, but with the way the news and prosecutors like to exaggerate everything you think they would have quoted the cost of the entire thing.
Why are we even talking about this?
The prof was either a complete idiot (and should put his Ph.D. back in the cereal box he got it from) or intentionally broke the law as some act of defiance.
What is unclear?
He knows he's working on a "secret" project used by the military. He probably got told 6 ways through Sunday he can't talk about it. And he goes to jail because he did what he was told to not do.
To say he should not get jail time, or that he's from an academic world, defies logic and COMMON SENSE. Gee, this is a secret military project, I think I'll not only take the data/laptop to China, but I'll share it with Chinese and Iranian students. Gimme a break. It makes no sense. It's much more likely, IMHO, that he was giving a one-finger salute to the US. Even if he weren't, he's a moron, and ignorance of the law is not a valid defence.
Presumably because the students weren't the ones who signed the reams of paperwork acknowledging they were being given access to sensitive data and shouldn't be sharing it with foreign nationals. Unless procedures have changed a lot, you don't get legitimate access to such information without being told ad nauseum who you should and shouldn't be sharing it with and what the penalties are for breaking those rules.
My experience with US security clearance was exactly as you describe. I literally had 8 hours of reading/signing documents and had to sign at least 3 that told me explicitly who I could and could not talk to about what I was doing. Each was read to me after I read it myself, and they went line by line to make sure I understood it. Roth is completely full of crap if he claims he didn't know. The process left me with the distinct impression that if I even had a hint that I shouldn't be talking about it or wasn't sure, I should keep my big mouth shut. The funny part is, I'm not sure I actually saw anything classified during my stint. Not that I'm going to be talking about any of it, because I'm just not sure, but still. Doubly funny was debriefing, that also took 8 hours where they went over everything again that I had gone through when I received clearance in the first place.
The first time I obtained security clearance, we were all told that not only were we barred for life from talking about any classified data without permission, but that they would keep the physical piece of paper that we signed stating we understood all this for at least 75 years.
They want to preclude the possibility that you will EVER think about claiming you didn't know the restrictions.
They're pretty clear what you can talk about and with whom. Moreover to your point, if someone takes a strong interest in your work, you shall document and report it as a potential security breach.
Roth is getting a pretty light slap with four years.
My experience with US security clearance was exactly as you describe. I literally had 8 hours of reading/signing documents and had to sign at least 3 that told me explicitly who I could and could not talk to about what I was doing. Each was read to me after I read it myself, and they went line by line to make sure I understood it. Roth is completely full of crap if he claims he didn't know. The process left me with the distinct impression that if I even had a hint that I shouldn't be talking about it or wasn't sure, I should keep my big mouth shut. The funny part is, I'm not sure I actually saw anything classified during my stint. Not that I'm going to be talking about any of it, because I'm just not sure, but still. Doubly funny was debriefing, that also took 8 hours where they went over everything again that I had gone through when I received clearance in the first place.
I used to have a top secret clearance and my experience was nothing close to yours. I simply had to take an oath and sign a one page document. My debriefing was even shorter. In fact, now that I think about it, my oath was taken when my secret clearance was granted. I did nothing further when my T/S went through.
My point is simply that this guy may have had an experience similar to mine and from the summary, (unless I skimmed too fast) it doesn't sound like he even had a clearance. This is an ITAR issue. Which by the way, seemed to be taken way more seriously at my company because people actually get thrown in prison for violating it when those violations are simply negligent. Negligent classified information violations were normally punished with a nasty gram email and a "don't do that again!" letter.
The rules have changed. It is now illegal to "export" ITAR data, that is "sensitive" defense technology to foreign persons. However, this data is not classified. You can tell it to any and every US Person: your friends, family, neighbors, convenience store clerk. SO long as they are a US Person and also know not to tell it to Foreign National, they can know it.
However, telling it to a Canadian can get you sent to prison.
The rules have changed. And it's damaging to critical industries and research institutions.
If this is ITAR and not classified data, then there may not be the signing of voluminous forms. ITAR just is. If your company is on top of it, then the staff will get powerpoint briefings about it. But there aren't signatures and forms and etc.
And everyone is liable regardless of whether they've heard of ITAR, had the powerpoint briefings or don't even work in defense industries. If you, say, bought a bulletproof vest from eBay and then traveled to Mexico you'd be guilty of an ITAR violation. (real example)
while it is certainly unfortunate that they got sensitive data - the violation of the ITAR was the professors alone and I am glad he was found guilty - aside from the obvious security issues giving away technology weakens our economic and business advantages as well - part of doing business in this country is playing by the rules - if you don't want to play by these rules, then work on non ITAR technologies instead
The professor did the world a favor. Sharing defense technology means conflicting powers are on equal strength and are less likely to go to war.
My god, I think he really believes that. What makes people less likely to go to war is having wealth and prosperity... something to lose, in other words. Giving away advanced military technology just makes it that much easier for a nation that has imperialistic tendencies to try and make something of it. You really need to have a better grasp of history than what you're displaying here.
The unfortunate truth is that being merely at technological parity, militarily-speaking, is not sufficient to dissuade some people from going to war anyways. You have to have demonstrably superior capabilities to have any chance at a deterrent effect. And that isn't counting the pathological types who simply don't care if you kill them or not so long as they can take you with them. Regardless, you want your enemies to know, beyond the slightest shadow of a doubt, that if they try anything they're going to take an awful pasting. And that means making damn sure they can't equal your ability to wage war without making at least the same investment. Granted, that also means that you shouldn't give them too much reason to want to make that investment, but in either case you don't make it easy for them.
So far as I'm concerned this "well, heck, they're going to get it anyways" attitude is damn near treasonous. I hope that our military R&D types don't share your relative ignorance, because we need to deny our enemies access to our most significant advances. Put it this way: it cost us a lot of money and time: we should see to it that it costs them the same. If it takes China or any other hostile power 'x" number of years to equal our current capabilities, well, that's 'x' years of relative peace we're going to have, because they won't be tempted to try anything. Put them on equal footing, and there's no telling what might happen.
Some of my professors (Score:5, Funny)
droned on and on too but I wouldn't send them to prison for it!
Guilty. (Score:5, Insightful)
If he didn't read his contract that's his problem. I also find it very unlikely.
Why is this on slashdot?
Re:Guilty. (Score:5, Funny)
He knew he wasn't supposed to do it, he was warned not to do it, he did it anyway. He pled guilty. If he didn't read his contract that's his problem. I also find it very unlikely. Why is this on slashdot?
Possibly to serve as a warning to others? That might be his whole purpose in life.
Parent
Re:Guilty. (Score:4, Insightful)
Because it's another crybaby story the govt. is evil, copyright is evil, and all nerds should be allowed free access to any information that is in the entire world. I'm surprised they didn't try to tie the iphone and google into it.
Parent
Re:Guilty. (Score:4, Funny)
That's all well and good, but how relevant is it to the Cloud?
Parent
Re:Guilty. (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, you cynic.
Why would anyone smart enough to get a Ph.D. even suspect that, after working on classified information, he shouldn't disclose that information to a student hand-selected to study with him by a totalitarian government with a history of using its military to take over others, repress dissent, and threaten other nations?
hawk
Parent
Re:Guilty. (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Guilty. (Score:4, Insightful)
If he didn't read his contract that's his problem. I also find it very unlikely.
Agreed. ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) is something that all defense workers are trained in. It's also explained very carefully that if there's a violation it's not the government program's fault, it's not the company's fault, but it's the employee that's going to prison. It's a pretty strict standard. Even discussing things in the public domain for the wrong purposes can land you in hot water-- giving a citation (book name, page number) of public domain information can violate ITAR if it's in response to, say, a question about missile technology. In essence what you exported there was your expertise in leading the foreign national to that source of information.
Incidentally, these are the same regulations that kept the old PowerMac G4's from being exported and led to the "tank" commercial at the time.
Parent
Re:Guilty. (Score:5, Interesting)
In essence what you exported there was your expertise in leading the foreign national to that source of information.
I'd like to add to this, because many people here on /. who don't have experience in these areas often ask, "Why is it illegal for a member of the military/Boeing employee/Raytheon employee/etc to say publicly what can already be found easily on wikipedia or other sources?"
The answer is: Because it verifies facts. An article by AP about the air force's new musical ice-cream truck UAV could only be written based on publicly-available facts or deduction. Once a member of the Air Force confirms to the press or anyone else that yes, we have a new ice-cream UAV and it is delicious, the subject is confirmed. Every member of the DoD, DoD contractors, and DoD researchers is like a walking snopes.com in that everything they say is scrutinized and accepted as the acting ultimate authority on the subject.
Here's a real world example based on my own experiences. There are maps online of a certain base in Iraq that give very detailed, very accurate information. You can find it, but I won't tell you which one it is. OK. But when we do our predeployment briefing to that base, and which uses *that map*, and which is given by Intel and is secret/noforn- ALL cell phones go away, all the doors are closed, and all the window blinds are closed. The fact that we are using that map as a fact... Makes that map a *Fact*. Capital "F".
See?
I realize that's at odds with much of what slashdottery stands for, but when lives are on the line secrecy matters. It may seem silly but it matters enough to people in the loop (like me...) to keep certain things under wraps.
Another real-world example: My base public relations officer called me in Iraq (from the U.S.) to talk to me about my blog (which was about my deployment). He cautioned me, in no uncertain terms, to be "very, very careful what I include in my essays." And this was after I took pains to change names, places, times, patterns, etc so that my account could easily be from any shitty place* in the world if you didn't personally know where I was.
-b
*No offense Iraq, it was just the weather. No really.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Guilty. (Score:5, Insightful)
Those of us who work in defense are trained until we're blue in the face about how to handle sensitive information, what is and is not releasable
He doesn't work in "defense", he's a retired University professor who works for a company doing work with plasma. Comparing him to yourself is disingenuous at best.
Universities (especially physics) works very differently than a company with regard to "classified" information. Here's how it works. You want research money. You apply for a grant from the DOE for said research money where you check "yes this has potential weapons applications" (because hey, what doesn't?). The DOE grants your request. In reality your research only meets the barest minimum for a qualification of "weapons potential". Yah, there's some kind of nonsense restriction on what you can do with it, but remember it never really had defense implications in the first place.
So, if we're talking about environments here, that's quite a different environment than the one you're describing.
Parent
Re:Guilty. (Score:5, Informative)
Okay. I work for a university and the government working in a similar field as the professor in question. I'm familiar with the ITAR regulations, and I sign agreements to not disclose this kind of information. I'm strictly science, yet I still have to use aircraft and spacecraft that are dual purposed. I know exactly the rules he had to follow...
Nope. I'm held to the same standards as my civil servant colleagues. I even have to take the same training sessions. We don't call it FIOS, or SECRET but the acronyms we use have same meanings associated with them.
The trouble with your argument is that the UAV in question is a UAV that is similar to the one used in defense, but assigned a civilian task. The information that he provided did compromise security.
Different? Yes. Different enough? No. I have projects that allow non-US grad students and I have projects that don't...
Parent
This is how ITAR hurts us. (Score:5, Informative)
And this is how ITAR is damaging to our national security. As the DOE and DOD are major funding agencies at universities and national labs, we are now creating a research system that prevents foreign nationals from participating. And since they are a large percentage of our grad students, that's a major problem. It subsequently makes the US a less enticing place for the skilled students we'd like to immigrate here.
Parent
Lamest court defense ever (Score:5, Funny)
Actually, more interesting than that... (Score:5, Interesting)
Since he seems to have been convicted under the EAR, which is a set of regulations having to do with rendering technical aid to foreigners, and not the ITAR, which is a set of regulations about exporting actual objects (such as munitions or rocket-control thingies), there is very close parsing required of the law to figure out what is Right or not.
After all, the material he distributed wasn't classified, and in principle the 1st Amendment to the U.S. constitution allows you to say whatever you want to whomever you want (provided that you aren't directly inciting a crime, or lying, or distributing classified information). It's especially interesting because most violations of the EAR never get to trial -- they are generally settled by defense contractors who are eager to make good so that the flow of federal dollars doesn't dry up -- so this is likely to be a strong legal precedent. In this case, as in so many, my guess is that he had the standard language in his federal contract -- essentially "I agree to abide by ITAR and EAR" -- so that the regulations can be enforced via contract law even if the ITAR and EAR are eventually found to be unconstitutional if applied to general citizens.
The most scary situation involving EAR/ITRAR is that I know of no legal precedent at all for the EAR in the case of a gifted, privately funded enthusiast just screwing around -- but it applies to many things that even hobbyists do now. If you take an interest in (say) cheap image stabilization systems or inertial guidance of vehicles, and share your work with some of your friends down at the rocket club (who happen to be exchange students from the Pacific Rim), the regulations say that you are liable for millions of dollars in fines and many years of jail time -- even though those technologies are well within the range of gifted college students today (and affordable for an enthusiast to tinker with). I have no idea what the outcome of such a case would be -- only that the legal bills would be immense and the hypothetical hobbyist's life would be put on hold for years, if the Feds decided to take an interest.
Parent
Not long enough (Score:5, Insightful)
Should have been 40 years, idiot. Just bringing the laptop to China is shear stupidity.
Re:Not long enough (Score:5, Funny)
Maybe, but his haircut is irrelevant. This was just irresponsible.
Parent
Re:Not long enough (Score:5, Insightful)
Especially after being told not to...
I don't truck much with "being told" what to do.
I do truck with signing a contract that lays out very explicitly what obligations and restrictions to which you you are voluntarily agreeing. He knew (or absolutely should have known) that when you sign a contract to consult for the DOD, you are accepting these restrictions.
This is about as much YRO (which has meant YR for a long time now anyway) as any other mundane contractual disputes that turn up.
Parent
Re:Not long enough (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Not long enough (Score:5, Insightful)
Contractual or not, four years for sharing some plans seems tad excessive.
Oh well. I guess you have to be American to understand the American judicial system.
What? My goodness, that anti-American commentary is become less and less rational on a daily basis.
... well, pretty much ANY country that has made a significant investment in military technology would (and have) handled similar cases. Compared to some of those countries, this is a slap on the wrist. I mean, after all the agreements he signed, just taking that laptop to CHINA, of all places, should have earned him a lot more than four years. I suspect the Feds cut him some slack.
Look, there's a lot of technology that could be used to kill a lot of people if the wrong hands get access to it. The American taxpayer paid for that R&D, and it should be used in our interests, not to aid an inimical foreign power like China (no, they're not our friends, and probably never will be.) I understand that you're just trying to get in a jab at the hated Americans, but ask yourself how the Russians, or the Iranians, or the Israelis, or the Chinese or
I'm sorry that you're ignorant of such matters, but you know, that is a curable condition.
Parent
Re:Not long enough (Score:4, Insightful)
Contractual or not, four years for sharing some plans seems tad excessive.
I'm not an American, and I think that four years for a very real leak of sensitive military information is quite mild, and only shows to point out the difference between U.S. (and other Western countries), and, say, China - consider what would happen to a Chinese professor in a similar situation.
Parent
Lying or stupid? (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's see, he signed a contract saying he was prohibited from sharing sensitive data with foreign nationals, then he shared it with forign nationals. Now he says "he was unaware that hiring the graduate students (to do work in the project) was a violation of his contract"? He's either too stupid to be a professor, or he's lying.
Have fun in prison bub.
Re:Lying or stupid? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm a university UAV researcher myself; I know lots of folks who work with the military to get funding to do research they think is important. It comes with the territory, and most of us are pretty cluey about the defense applications of what we do. I have been to plenty of conferences where the guys from Iran and China are presenting trivial results or not bothering to present at all, only to attend every potentially valuable seminar they can. We know they're trying to use our stuff, they know they're trying to use our stuff, but we feel that sharing knowledge and putting it out there is crucial for the science.
For that reason people are careful about the alliances they make with the military. Working on national security stuff generally means you can't publish anything valuable you come up. I know a few collegues well who can't say what they did between years X and Y when they go for a job interview - it can be kryptonite to your career.
I don't think this guy was necessarily stupid or foolish - I think he was careless after being so used to the routine of publish or perish that he forgot who his collaborators were, and that was his mistake.
Parent
Re:Lying or stupid? (Score:5, Interesting)
I simply don't buy into any arguments presented thus far, for defending a lighter sentence.
I'm the absent-minded type. From experience, I can assure people that the sheer number of security briefings, security awareness tests and periodioc recertifications and signed contracts makes it so even the dumbest idiot can't claim they weren't aware. And yeah, it's corny or awkward as it is to say "I've agreed not to discuss it" to a loved one or potential employer.
With experience, you learn to deflect the "but surely you trust me, don't you?" with "I trust you and think you deserve to know. However, that is not the issue. I gave a solemn promise and feel an ethical duty to make my word mean something. Please don't continue to put me in awkward situations or I will start to think less of you."
The interview process in my own company involves and ethics/honor test that asks the applicant about classified work and if they start to give details, they're not invited back. Who wants to hire dishonorable people to work next to them? Not me.
As far as employment, you can get validation that you were legitimately employed and others in the reseach/tech/engineering industry are used to dealing with it. All classified programs will have an associated FSO (Facility Security Officer) that can provide you process guidance and that persons name and contact info is made clear in the security training and if anyone legitimately wants help with this, drop me a line and I'll do my best.
From experience, the real issue is lack of maturity and strong personal sense of ethics.
Parent
Re:Lying or stupid? (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
He got what he deserved. (Score:3, Insightful)
You can't work on a top-secret project without signing very serious agreements with Uncle Sam. It just doesn't happen. Therefore he knew damned well he wasn't allowed to share this information, but did so anyway. What the fuck did he expect? What the fuck would *you* expect? If you expected to get away with something like that without consequence, you're a fucking moron.
What the...?! (Score:5, Funny)
and Sirous Nourgostar of Iran to work
Did George Lucas get offspring in Iran or something?
As a guy who works on this sort of stuff (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm not entirely surprised by either the sentence, or the seeming lack of security consciousness on the part of the professor and possibly his school. When working on defense-related work it's always best to treat sensitive material with the respect it deserves - in many cases there's no need to go overboard with encryption, physical security, or whatnot, but reasonable measures (e.g., not bringing the Goddamned laptop overseas) should always be taken.
However, from what I heard, the project Dr. Roth was working on wasn't entirely black-ops sort of stuff - he was merely integrating technology previously developed by himself (and others) under funding not remotely related to defense.
Antithetical to "education". (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't blame or absolve the professor - He had a contract, and I suppose the legal details of this boil down to a matter of contract law (though I most certainly do have a problem with prison time rather than monetary damages for breach of contract). But I do blame both his university and the government itself.
I blame the university for undermining any sense of credibility by selling out to the highest bidder at the expense of discrimination against an arbitrary list of students - Students who paid the same tuition as every other student, yet cannot experience the same intellectual freedoms as their peers all because some magic list-of-the-week says their Fearless Leader (whom in many cases they came to the US because they don't like the policies or education climate back home) pissed in our Cheerios.
And I blame the government for foisting their homework onto a domain that largely considers secrecy either beneath consideration or outright contemptible. Don't want foreign students to have access to military projects? Simple - Give those projects to standard military-industrial contractors familiar with paranoid levels of obfuscation and mistrust such as Lockheed, Grumman, Boeing or the like. And if they do decide to tap academia for parts of their research, I blame them for not taking care to prevent any one group from having "enough" information to do anything useful with.
You don't spank a baby for giggling at butterflies, and you don't hold it accountable if you give it a gun and someone gets hurt. Simple as that.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
at the expense of discrimination against an arbitrary list of students - Students who paid the same tuition as every other student, yet cannot experience the same intellectual freedoms as their peers all because some magic list-of-the-week says their Fearless Leader (whom in many cases they came to the US because they don't like the policies or education climate back home) pissed in our Cheerios.
'Hate to pull you down from your clouds, but you are way off. First of all, none of these graduate students, at least in physical sciences, actually "pay tuition". Usually in one way (working as teaching assistant or research assistant) or another (grants and fellowships), they will not only attend the school tuition-free, they will also get paid living expenses. I should know, I'm one of these graduate students (although not an international one).
In fact, if it's a public institution, these foreign graduat
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Students who paid the same tuition as every other student, yet cannot experience the same intellectual freedoms as their peers all because some magic list-of-the-week says their Fearless Leader (whom in many cases they came to the US because they don't like the policies or education climate back home) pissed in our Cheerios.
Actually, ITAR regulations require that no foreign nationals work on the project -- not just ones from countries like China and Iran. Many universities (or individual professors) do actually reject any ITAR projects, since it places significant restrictions on them and their students.
Plasma actuator (Score:4, Insightful)
Forget the prison sentence, I want to learn about the "plasma actuator that could help reduce drag on the wings of drones". (This is a tech site, remember?) So, how do these work?
Been there, done that ... (Score:5, Interesting)
OK, so I'm in Canada, and everyone knows that Canadians are slackers when it comes to security (sarcasm for the humor challenged).
The prof had to be ignoring the rules deliberately. The paperwork I had to sign required the details of every student working on the project. They didn't have to be security cleared but they sure did have to be Canadian or American. There was no chance to skip over that clause in the contract; a security guy read it to me out loud and made damn sure I understood what it meant.
American Engineering Research == Foreign Students (Score:3, Informative)
A big problem/bug/feature of American academic engineering research groups is that the graduate students and post-docs are predominantly foreign, typically from China and India. American citizens with advanced engineering degrees are a dying breed - Americans don't (in general) aspire to get PhDs in engineering.
So if you are soliciting proposals to American universities for defense-related research, be warned that whomever is doing the research (even if they themselves are citizens and cleared) are likely doing that research in a room full of foreign nationals.
I Wasn't Bothered By The Guy's Sentence... (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.engr.uky.edu/~jdjacob/fml/research/plasma/index.html [uky.edu]
...and a bunch of other good articles listed after it.
Does the DOD think they not have the Internet in China and Iran?
Just by reading this article, you can get a good sense of the concept, which has to do with creating high-speed, non-mechanical aircraft control surfaces via boundary layer manipulation. Is this really that big of a secret?
I'll post more on this after I investigate the thump on the roof and see who's at the front door.
Re:I Wasn't Bothered By The Guy's Sentence... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
$6K - WTF? (Score:4, Interesting)
What the hell kind of contract with the DoD is only $6K?
The cost of a security clearance for one person is at least $40K.
Maybe it was one stage of a multi-stage contract, but with the way the news and prosecutors like to exaggerate everything you think they would have quoted the cost of the entire thing.
This entire conversation is rediculous (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Why stop there.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Presumably because the students weren't the ones who signed the reams of paperwork acknowledging they were being given access to sensitive data and shouldn't be sharing it with foreign nationals. Unless procedures have changed a lot, you don't get legitimate access to such information without being told ad nauseum who you should and shouldn't be sharing it with and what the penalties are for breaking those rules.
Parent
Re:Why stop there.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Why stop there.. (Score:5, Funny)
that's just for grunts. Once you get really senior, you can show classified documents to press photographers in public [guardian.co.uk]
Parent
I remember the first time I signed... (Score:5, Informative)
The first time I obtained security clearance, we were all told that not only were we barred for life from talking about any classified data without permission, but that they would keep the physical piece of paper that we signed stating we understood all this for at least 75 years.
They want to preclude the possibility that you will EVER think about claiming you didn't know the restrictions.
SirWired
Parent
Re:I remember the first time I signed... (Score:4, Funny)
Yay for Wikileaks.
Parent
Re:Why stop there.. (Score:5, Insightful)
I work on NATO military things.
They're pretty clear what you can talk about and with whom. Moreover to your point, if someone takes a strong interest in your work, you shall document and report it as a potential security breach.
Roth is getting a pretty light slap with four years.
Parent
Re:Why stop there.. (Score:5, Interesting)
My experience with US security clearance was exactly as you describe. I literally had 8 hours of reading/signing documents and had to sign at least 3 that told me explicitly who I could and could not talk to about what I was doing. Each was read to me after I read it myself, and they went line by line to make sure I understood it. Roth is completely full of crap if he claims he didn't know. The process left me with the distinct impression that if I even had a hint that I shouldn't be talking about it or wasn't sure, I should keep my big mouth shut. The funny part is, I'm not sure I actually saw anything classified during my stint. Not that I'm going to be talking about any of it, because I'm just not sure, but still. Doubly funny was debriefing, that also took 8 hours where they went over everything again that I had gone through when I received clearance in the first place.
I used to have a top secret clearance and my experience was nothing close to yours. I simply had to take an oath and sign a one page document. My debriefing was even shorter. In fact, now that I think about it, my oath was taken when my secret clearance was granted. I did nothing further when my T/S went through.
My point is simply that this guy may have had an experience similar to mine and from the summary, (unless I skimmed too fast) it doesn't sound like he even had a clearance. This is an ITAR issue. Which by the way, seemed to be taken way more seriously at my company because people actually get thrown in prison for violating it when those violations are simply negligent. Negligent classified information violations were normally punished with a nasty gram email and a "don't do that again!" letter.
Parent
The rules have changed. (Score:5, Informative)
The rules have changed. It is now illegal to "export" ITAR data, that is "sensitive" defense technology to foreign persons. However, this data is not classified. You can tell it to any and every US Person: your friends, family, neighbors, convenience store clerk. SO long as they are a US Person and also know not to tell it to Foreign National, they can know it.
However, telling it to a Canadian can get you sent to prison.
The rules have changed. And it's damaging to critical industries and research institutions.
Parent
Re:Why stop there.. (Score:5, Informative)
If this is ITAR and not classified data, then there may not be the signing of voluminous forms. ITAR just is. If your company is on top of it, then the staff will get powerpoint briefings about it. But there aren't signatures and forms and etc.
And everyone is liable regardless of whether they've heard of ITAR, had the powerpoint briefings or don't even work in defense industries. If you, say, bought a bulletproof vest from eBay and then traveled to Mexico you'd be guilty of an ITAR violation. (real example)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
while it is certainly unfortunate that they got sensitive data - the violation of the ITAR was the professors alone and I am glad he was found guilty - aside from the obvious security issues giving away technology weakens our economic and business advantages as well - part of doing business in this country is playing by the rules - if you don't want to play by these rules, then work on non ITAR technologies instead
Re:An marican hero (Score:4, Insightful)
That worked really well in 1914!
Parent
Re:An marican hero (Score:4, Insightful)
The professor did the world a favor. Sharing defense technology means conflicting powers are on equal strength and are less likely to go to war.
My god, I think he really believes that. What makes people less likely to go to war is having wealth and prosperity ... something to lose, in other words. Giving away advanced military technology just makes it that much easier for a nation that has imperialistic tendencies to try and make something of it. You really need to have a better grasp of history than what you're displaying here.
The unfortunate truth is that being merely at technological parity, militarily-speaking, is not sufficient to dissuade some people from going to war anyways. You have to have demonstrably superior capabilities to have any chance at a deterrent effect. And that isn't counting the pathological types who simply don't care if you kill them or not so long as they can take you with them. Regardless, you want your enemies to know, beyond the slightest shadow of a doubt, that if they try anything they're going to take an awful pasting. And that means making damn sure they can't equal your ability to wage war without making at least the same investment. Granted, that also means that you shouldn't give them too much reason to want to make that investment, but in either case you don't make it easy for them.
So far as I'm concerned this "well, heck, they're going to get it anyways" attitude is damn near treasonous. I hope that our military R&D types don't share your relative ignorance, because we need to deny our enemies access to our most significant advances. Put it this way: it cost us a lot of money and time: we should see to it that it costs them the same. If it takes China or any other hostile power 'x" number of years to equal our current capabilities, well, that's 'x' years of relative peace we're going to have, because they won't be tempted to try anything. Put them on equal footing, and there's no telling what might happen.
Parent