US Eases Internet Export Rules To Iran, Sudan, Cuba

coondoggie writes "Looking to facilitate what it calls free speech rights in countries that don't look favorably at such liberties, the US government today said it would ease the regulations around exporting Internet-based applications to Iran, Sudan and Cuba. Specifically, the Treasury Department said it would add general licenses (PDF) authorizing the exportation of free, personal, Internet-based communications services – such as instant messaging, chat and email, and social networking – to those three countries. The amendments also allow the exportation of related software to Iran and Sudan, the department said in a release (the US Commerce Department controls software exports with Cuba). Until now all such exports would have broken federal laws."

Comments

Re:Eh?

[palegray.net]

Jesus, both of you need to just stop.

Re:Eh?

[trurl7]

Agreed :)

Re:Eh?

[Cassius Corodes]

This is not about IM or gmail or some other shit like that - this is about anonymity software like haystack (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haystack_%28software%29) that has been designed to bypass filters and protect people from government surveillance that has been sitting and waiting to be released because of export restrictions that would make its release a crime. The authors have been loudly calling for this amendment for a while and I am glad that they finally got around to it. So instead of dissing the govt, you should be thanking them for doing the right thing, or at least righting a previous wrong.