How long US tech companies need to bring Sudan's sanctions easing into reality?

4 points

11 years ago

It's been almost a month since the US deparment of treasury announced the easing of Sudan's technology and communication sanction to help Sudan's people communicate with each other! [1] Which should give Sudanese students, entrepreneurs, businesspeople, journalists, civil leaders and others better access to the telecommunications tools they need to study, create, grow and serve their communities. [2]

People in Sudan been suffering from those sanctions since 1996, we can't access google play, apple app store, buy someting from Amazon, ebay, buy an album in iTunes, donate to our favorite open source projects, ...etc and now when that we finally are allowed to enjoy these services, companies (Google, Apple, Amazon, ... etc) don't seem to care much about updating their policies!

We still see the disappointing "Your country is forbidden from accessing this service" message everywhere on the interent! >> it just hurts!

So, did the world make a decision to disallow us the right to access those services for good? how long this is going to last?

[1] http://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/OFAC-Enforcement/Pages/20150217_33.aspx

[2] http://blogs.wsj.com/riskandcompliance/2015/02/18/u-s-treasury-allows-personal-communication-exports-to-sudan/

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