HackingTeam's Global Export License Revoked 29
An anonymous reader writes: You might remember HackingTeam from an epic data leak back in July 2015. Now, the Italian Ministry of Economical Progress has revoked HackingTeam's licence to export their Galileo remote control software abroad, two years before it would expire, on April 30, 2018. Until the situation changes, HackingTeam will have to ask express permission for every single commercial operation that involves the sale of their Galileo system abroad.
Seeya! (Score:4, Insightful)
Sounds like the perfect time for them to relocate.
Re: (Score:1)
Sounds like the perfect time for them to relocate.
Except moving the code out of the country, even to another of their offices, would probably be considered an export, and the government would get to say NO. If they do it anyway and leave, since catching it would be near impossible, would open them to being arrested and extradited if they ever set foot in a country with an extradition treaty with Italy.
Re: (Score:2)
Sounds like the perfect time for them to relocate.
It's a double edged sword. The Italian government was concerned that they were doing business with Azerbaijan, Egypt, etc., but also wasn't interfering the same way that a shadier government would.
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Here's a dollar ($), go buy yourself a clue. Just as one can't legally export classified information by arguing that doing it piece-wise one can't do that with restricted software.
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OTOH, depending on how big the code base is and how much the "rogue nations" are willing to pay for it, it might be worth a ground-up re-write.
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what exactly does this software do? (Score:1)
The summary and TFA were no help at figuring out what exactly their software is.
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It's cool they could sell it to oppressive governments to help their murderous thug leaders keep their boot pressed on their subjects' necks. That's the important thing for free countries.
Pack your bags, gents! (Score:1)
Until the situation changes, HackingTeam will have to ask express permission for every single commercial operation that involves the sale of their Galileo system abroad.
Or, they will simply move their operation elsewhere.
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As Anonymous Coward explained [slashdot.org], doing so would likely require rewriting the software from scratch.
Berne Convention throughout WTO (Score:2)
Could they move to a country that doesn't have IP laws tied to Italy
If by "IP" you mean copyright, then all WTO members "have IP laws tied to Italy", as the Berne Convention is an essential WTO treaty.
Not really so (Score:1)
Reading the original article (in Italian): after having their global licence revoked, Hacking Team won't need to ask permission for every sale generically made "abroad", but only if they wish to sell their software to 46 specific countries.
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Also its back on now for the third time now I think....
Maybe they can just "die" altogether (Score:2)
I looked up their hipster web site [hackingteam.it] and was so repulsed by their brain-dead stupid eye-destroying low-contrast color scheme that I was instantly prejudiced against them. My snap impression was then reinforced by their stupid pandering column [hackingteam.it] on the San Bernardino iPhone controversy.
Perhaps that explains. . . (Score:2)
. . . .why the US office they were trying to set up, disappeared. And the only reason I know about the prospective US office, is that I was being recruited for it. . . and then it suddenly went silent. . .
Has to be political (Score:4, Interesting)
Short story long, generally the US has among the most byzantine and archaic export control regulation in use by first world countries, specifically ITAR. It's largely unchanged from the 1970's/1980's notion of 'high tech', so you get a lot of interesting stuff that ends up on the US munitions list. Europe in general doesn't have nearly the same level of export control, and gives a substantial advantage in the global defense contracting world.
That said, many Euro defense contractors have extremely tight relations with their export licensing agency. They dance to the tune very closely, which does actually reduce the amount of legislation or regulation. As a government entity, why bind yourself with written rulings when your customers will do exactly what you tell them? I can very well imagine, and would be shocked to see otherwise, that any Euro export related tech organization that did not have extremely tight relations with their export licensing agency would be punished at least this harshly. Expect a LOT of foot dragging. Not enough for this company to win in court, just enough to cause them to lose business or go bankrupt.