Actually, if it would be illegal to sell the technology to an Iranian, and you're speaking the official language of Iran, then it would make a lot of sense for them to ask you if you're an Iranian citizen. Clearly the manager misunderstood and misapplied the policy, but this is not "racial profiling". It's linguistic profiling, and it's the only reasonable way to enforce the export law.
BS. I'd say it's more reasonable to check a billing address. Speaking the language of a country that we have export restrictions on is not a reasonable filter.
The responsibility is to not sell merchandise in Iran, not to refuse sale of merchandise in America based on nationality. Apple isn't playing the role of an exporter here.
Any sale at a brick-and-mortar store in the U.S. does not constitute export. Apple, and the store are safe from legal liability.
edit - hmm, as pointed out elsewhere, there does seem to be some cases where selling to an individual is still restricted.
That's sort of stretching the bounds of the word "reasonable" :)
The law here seems to be over-broad. Retailers should be able to sell to anyone in their stores and not be held responsible for what someone may or may not do with it once it leaves their store.
Alternatively, I guess they could do ID and background checks, handgun-shopping style.
You should think of this law in the same way as the fact that you can't offer someone a job without verifying their legal work status. It's not "profiling", because it is your responsibility to ascertain that you are not breaking the law. You should positively verify this with everyone.
The problem is that the law is being applied to completely mainstream consumer items, not ballistic missile technology or something.
Jafarzadeh said he was helping a friend buy an iPhone. That friend was from Iran, living and studying in the Atlanta area on a visa.
In this case, the "friend" clearly is subject to export control.
If he tries to take the prohibited items baack to Iran that's US Customs problem - not Apple's
Let me get this straight.. you're saying if an Iranian, a Cuban, or a Libyan person walks into Walmart and buys a $300 Windows PC with Bitlocker on it, that Walmart has committed a Federal crime?
That's insane.
Makes me glad I don't work in retail.
As a european company want to launch our satellite on a Chinese rocket. It will leave here sealed in an environmental shroud and go up on their rocket without ever leaving our sight. But because it contains made in USA components = denied export of restricted technology.
Ok so we will design and build the satellite in China allowing them full access to all the technology and giving them a leg up in the production of this kind of payload = no problem.
And Chinasat 6B is now happily broadcasting crap to the people of china
edit: Guess I'm wrong, see post mentioning § 734.2(2)(ii) below.
It is not a salesperson's job to interrogate customers to ensure their intentions are not to export things. That would be stupid.
Apple must ensure they don't export things to Iran, like other retailers....... but that means, you know, shipping stuff to iran.
Only if you are being a completely stupid and bigoted bastard. Otherwise the only sane way to enforce an export law if you are a company, is to not deliver items to that country.
Everything outside that is up to governmental customs and border control and no court would enforce not selling IPads to Americans who are born in Iran and speak Farsi. Otherwise it is nothing less than apartheid.
The policy quoted states:
the exportation, sale or supply from the U.S. to Iran of any Apple goods is strictly prohibited without authorization by the U.S. government.
It does not say you are not allowed to sell them to people who speak Farsi, even if they were born in Iran. It just says that Apple is not allowed to send them out of the country. You could possibly also claim that you are not allowed to sell directly to current Iranian citizens, as they could be said to represent Iran, although this would still be reasonably open to question, especially if they have a green card, which are available to current Iranian citizens.
If two white guys with snow on their boots ask "how much for the nucular wessels" you aren't to sell to them.
[edit] also, ipads, while shiny, are not of the same export class as 'nucular wessels'. I think this might be that pattern recognition problem we've been talking about. Have you been remembering to take your pills at the right time?
In other words they were actually going to break export restrictions. Perhaps they accidentally mentioned this to the Apple associate, but not to the reporter? Because "I'm getting this for my cousin in Iran" may sound innocent but would actually force the associate to not sell the item.
ps. The state dept doesn't do reasonable - check the small print you need to agree to before downloading something as potentially lethal as a Dell mouse driver.
She said she was buying it for her Iranian friend - that's
enough to reasonably suspect.
p(get caught) * p(jury will believe excuse) * f(society thinks offense is serious) * f(punishment)
Consider:
1: I though I could park here
2: She looked 18
3: Whats so bad about exporting restricted technology to Iran?
* Get caught = a
* jury will believe excuse = b
* society thinks offense is serious = c
* punishment = d
Therefore provide formuala for p(a), p(b), p(c) and p(d).
That’s what those who respond with “But it’s effective!” to racial profiling just do not get.
To clarify: racial profiling means using someone's race in place of legitimate evidence. In the case of this export rule, though, speaking the official language of an embargoed country sure sounds like legitimate reason to take further action.
Most Farsi speakers are from Iran. Most people from Iran speak Farsi. It's completely legitimate to assume that someone speaking Farsi is at least from Iran, and may reasonably be a visiting Iranian national.
The mistake in this situation was that the manager applied the rule to anybody from Iran, and ignored the person's US residence and citizenship.
So what do you think would happen to a white person who was speaking Farsi while shopping at an Apple store?
However, language is a choice. Language is something that can be controlled. If you're being discriminated against because your language is a very strong indicator that you are a foreign national from an embargoed country, then it's really hard to say that linguistic profiling is wrong, because the two biggest objections to racial profiling don't apply.
Other characteristics that serve for racial profiling might be harder to change (some might not be changeable at all) but they are still in principle the same. (Someone wearing clothing that is more typical elsewhere could much easier change his or her clothing than I can get rid of my accent. That doesn’t, however, exclude the possibility of racial profiling based on clothing.)
So no, it wouldn't make any sense. None.