In a world that runs on data and the cloud, where businesses collaborate across borders every day, export control might seem like an old-school concept. But in reality, it’s more relevant now than ever.
Export control refers to laws and regulations that limit the export of certain goods, technologies, and, yes, even information. These laws are designed to protect national security and enforce foreign policy, controlling the distribution of physical equipment or data that could be weaponized by adversaries.
Controlling physical exports is pretty straightforward: you can count shipments, track containers, and check paperwork. But controlling digital information, especially across global teams and cloud-based systems, is anything but simple.
Information subject to export control laws is constantly moving across borders—whether it’s for business, R&D initiatives, or intelligence sharing—and consistently monitoring and controlling these exchanges at scale is becoming more difficult. Without an effective compliance strategy, violations can lead to hefty fines, reputation damage, loss of export privileges, and even imprisonment.
For companies in aerospace, defense, and high-tech sectors, complying with export control laws, especially as they apply to data, is crucial. And it’s not just manufacturers or defense contractors. Any wholesalers, software providers, cloud vendors, third-party suppliers, or other organizations involved in dual-use technologies need to have export control on their radar.
Export control laws generally apply to technical data, which, from a national security perspective, can be just as vulnerable as physical goods. Technical data could include user manuals, documentation, blueprints, diagrams, engineering plans, photographs, intellectual property, communications discussing controlled equipment, and more.
For companies in industries like defense and aerospace, this means a substantial amount of their data and communications likely fall under export control regulations—information that requires permits or licenses from the government to be shared externally.
However, it’s important to recognize that it’s not just military-related information that counts. Export Administration Regulations (EAR) cover technologies that have civilian, military, or dual-use applications, while International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) govern items and data on the United States Munitions List (USML). ITAR generally restricts access to US citizens unless specific authorization is granted.
Companies must also consider restrictions under the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), which enforces sanctions and trade restrictions based on US foreign policy. In Canada, the Export and Import Permits Act (EIPA) governs similar types of exports, including sensitive technologies and information.
Why do even well-resourced companies sometimes miss the mark on their export control obligations? It boils down to three main challenges: complex dataflows, regulator and user interpretation, and outdated processes.
Modern supply chains are global by design. Companies often rely on international subcontractors, offshore teams, and cloud infrastructure spread across continents. This makes managing where export controlled information travels and who can access it incredibly difficult. Part of the challenge involves understanding which regulations apply based on where information is shared, requiring organizations to map export control policies across distributed operations and data.
Let’s say you’re a US defense contractor with local and United Kingdom-based offices as well as global suppliers. If a manual classified under ITAR is shared with a non-US citizen or stored on a cloud server abroad, you’re potentially violating regulations. Things can get even messier when subcontractors engage sub-tier partners you might not know about. It’s easy to see how compliance becomes tricky to manage when there may be dozens of partners and subcontractors involved in the supply chain.
One of the more frustrating aspects of export compliance is how much is up to a regulator’s discretion. Regulators often evaluate compliance based on intent and effort, not just outcomes. This means companies must show they’re doing everything they reasonably can to stay compliant.
What’s more, users may interpret “export controls” as applying only to data shared with users in another country. In reality, sharing with a foreign national within your borders or using foreign-owned cloud infrastructure can also qualify without official authorization. In other words, sharing export-controlled documents with a foreign national working in a domestic office could be considered an “export.”
Many organizations still treat export controls as case-by-case projects. For example, companies may build custom access control mechanisms for each new initiative or manually process information-sharing requests to ensure compliance. While traditional data compliance tools can tell you where export controlled information is, it’s usually up to IT teams to apply controls manually. This piecemeal approach is expensive, laborious, and error-prone. It can also take months to launch bespoke controls, which is not ideal when regulators favor a proactive approach.
With export controlled information, staying compliant requires a comprehensive data management strategy tailored to your specific industry, locales, and global networks.
As we mentioned, regulated data can encompass many different types of information and communications, and compliance often comes down to regulator discretion. In this landscape, having robust compliance strategies in place will not only protect your company’s data and national interests but also serve as an informal insurance policy, enabling you to prove due diligence.
Whether you have an in-house legal team or rely on external advisors, expert guidance is critical. A good legal partner will help you evaluate compliance risks, draft strong policies, and ensure they’re actually enforced. The mere presence of a legal team can help demonstrate that the organization is serious about export control.
Under legal guidance, create clear policies that define how export controlled information should be handled. Define what counts as regulated data, who can access it, and how it should be labeled or protected. Involving your international partners in shaping these policies can also help ensure they’re realistic and enforceable across borders. Consider establishing policies that go beyond what is needed to meet the minimum legal requirements. This helps foster a compliance-forward culture and again demonstrates a proactive strategy.
Export controls aren’t just a legal or IT problem—they’re a people problem. End users need to understand what types of information are controlled and how to handle them to avoid violations. Training should be a part of onboarding and ongoing professional development, ensuring staff are versed in evolving regulations and datasets.
You can’t manage what you can’t see. Know where your data lives, how it’s shared, and which export control regulations it falls under. This is key to identifying non-compliant activities and confirming which licenses or permissions you need to obtain throughout your operations. Export controlled information should also be clearly labeled so users know how to safely handle it.
Even if your organization closely follows export control policies, these efforts may be futile in the eyes of regulators if you can’t prove compliance. That’s why it’s important to maintain detailed records of any licenses or authorizations tied to export controlled data, as well as have a reliable system to record internal and external data transactions. A clear audit trail will help validate compliance, support reports or investigations, and potentially reduce penalties if something goes wrong.
Attribute-based access controls (ABAC) are key with export regulations. With ABAC, user access is based on specific attributes—like nationality, job role, or location—so you can ensure only authorized individuals can view sensitive or controlled information. In a context where factors like user location and nationality are necessary for compliance, this approach is more effective than traditional role-based systems.
Data visibility, reliable audit trails, and strong access permissions are extremely difficult to achieve at scale without some level of automation. Organizations need compliance solutions that don’t just show them where vulnerable information is, but also apply controls without significant manual effort. This is where tools like the ORIGIN data governance platform come in, improving export control scalability with the combined power of AI and blockchain.
Here’s how ORIGIN functions in a typical export control workflow: imagine that same US-based defense company, but this time, an engineer in California wants to send design files to a sales rep in the UK. Through ORIGIN, the engineer could use AI to compare the files against relevant export control policies, redact any sensitive information in one click, and enable access to specific users based on location. Every interaction with the files would be recorded on a secure blockchain, giving compliance and legal teams full visibility.
Managing export controls isn’t getting any easier. Geopolitical tensions, more fragmented data sovereignty laws, and globally distributed workforces all complicate meeting regulations like ITAR. But with the right strategy and the right tools, you can better protect your technical data and turn compliance into a competitive advantage.
For instance, solutions like ORIGIN allow you to centralize information access, apply consistent export controls, and maintain detailed records, all without slowing the organization down. This makes it possible to create unified policies across global operations—and perhaps most importantly, help provide the kind of transparency and accountability regulators expect.
By building a system that’s proactive, flexible, and auditable, you’re not just safeguarding your organization and national interests. You’re setting a golden standard for how export-controlled data should be managed.