The Office of the State Dept. Spokesperson responded to a question as to whether or not U.S. based social media companies, such as Facebook, violate sanctions if Foreign Terrorists Organizations (FTOs) agree to their company’s contractual agreement before establishing an account.
We received the question by email, along with the DOS answer.
The answer: “This is an issue governed by U.S. law, including laws that regulate interactions with designated entities. For example, persons subject to U.S. jurisdiction are prohibited from knowingly providing material support or resources to an entity that has been designated as Foreign Terrorist Organizations under section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act.
“Additionally, it is illegal for persons subject to U.S. jurisdiction to engage in transactions with an entity that has been designated a Specially Designated Global Terrorist under Executive Order 13224.”
President Bush signed Executive Order 13224 on September 23, 2001. Executive Order 13224 gives the U.S. Government a powerful tool to impede terrorist funding and is part of our national commitment to lead the international effort to bring a halt to the evil of terrorist activity.
The assortment of Specially Designated Nationals List (SDN) lists is ginormous, but to make matters short, download the Complete Specially Designated Nationals List (in PDF format) and just find the first “Abu” (Abu Marzook, a Hamas official, in this case) and proceed from there to search for each name on, say, Facebook. Any active Facebook page run under one of the names on the U.S. ginormous list is grounds for a complaint with the operator and the Dept. of Homeland Security.
There’s a text only version as well.
There’s also SDN Search, an online application to search the SDN list.
Something nice to do with your free time on Chanukah.