ITAR Bona fide and full time employee exemption

Many universities can use the bona fide full time employee exemption under ITAR 125.4(b)(10) but must make sure that they follow the conditions of using this exemption. This comes in handy when you are dealing with a deemed export issue.

1) can only be applied to unclassified technical data disclosed in the U.S.
2) must be a U.S. institution of higher learning
3) the foreign person must be a bona fide full time regular employee
4) the foreign employee's must live in the U.S. while employed by the institution
5) the foreign employee cannot be a national of a proscribed country under ITAR 126.1
6) the institution must notify the foreign employee in writing that the technical data may not be transferred to other foreign nationals without the prior written approval of the DDTC

Please Note: This exemption is not available under the EAR or OFAC, only ITAR has this exemption. Make sure you check the proscribed country list as it may change and these are not the same as embargoed or sanctioned countries under OFAC. The ITAR list of proscribed countries is much longer. To comply with condition (6), I always get the signature of the foreign national employee as well as the lead investigator with a statement that they understand the conditions of the exemption and will abide by them. Remember that all documents must be maintained for 5 years per the regulations.