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from the making-a-list-and-checking-it-twice dept.
c0lo writes:
An Australian blogger shares his personal experience with orders put on hold by the Australian subsidiary of Element 14 (the former Farnell shop), reportedly based on a watch list maintained by US govt.
From the blog:
The counter person wasn't sure, so checked with someone else who came and wasn't 100% sure, but knew that the system does automatically flag orders based on various identifiers. It could have possibly been one of those stupid US government trade restriction things, because, you know capacitors and opamps can be used by evil terrorists and the like... (International customers have to fill out silly forms with US distributors and manufacturers saying we won't use the parts in nuclear weapons - seriously)
But they enquired further with someone else and the word came back that it wasn't the parts that had been flagged, it was my NAME that was flagged. And they said it was a US government watch list of some description. I was stunned, and it seemed like they didn't quite understand why I was so shocked at this. Because, you know, the whole world has to just sit by and let the US government dictate everything at will.
...
So lets see if I have this straight - An Australian subsidiary, owned by a UK parent company, listed on the UK stock exchange, has an ordering system that automatically matches generic names against some secret US Government watch list, and flags those orders and puts them on hold, for parts that are already stocked in Australia, are likely not made in the US, and likely have come from the main UK warehouse. Call me stupid, but something doesn't seem right with that...
(Score: 5, Interesting) by frojack on Wednesday February 26 2014, @07:17PM
Its an Australian company. He was buying in-stock parts, (in stock in Australia).
So there was never a reason to check with the UK to fill the order.
We still don't know what these innocuous parts were. Precursors to bomb components?
We still don't know the nature of this "don't sell" list. (or if it in fact exists).
It might be something as stupid as the UK government deciding the No fly list (another travesty) should also be used for other purposes.
In any event, there is no such thing US "don't sell" list. (Although explosives or precursors, including some fertilizers, require some checking. You better actually own 500 acres if you order a boatload of ammonia fertilizer, but this is all done not by any government list of names, just local suppliers knowing their customers).
So this whole description sounds kind of bogus, yet another excuse to lay blame on the US, when in fact it is just as likely to be some UK or Australian rule, or more likely a company rule.
This guy is well known. He has well over a 100,000 followers on YouTube.
He's always building nifty things and video blogging about it. Any project he starts can cause a run on parts as all of his viewers rush out and try to buy them. It could be this stupid company they have a policy of just stocking what ever he orders in large quantity, and needed time to do so.
But some times he gets a little too energetic: See his Youtube home page:h [youtube.com]
https://www.youtube.com/user/EEVblog?feature=watc
Watch the first 30 seconds of that.
In any event, I'd be looking for a different supplier if I was him.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Wednesday February 26 2014, @08:32PM
We still don't know what these innocuous parts were. Precursors to bomb components?
Quite possibly. Capacitors, resistors, and 555 timer ICs are all very useful for making bombs. So is wire.
(Score: 2) by mojo chan on Wednesday February 26 2014, @11:07PM
And now David Jones everywhere are worried that the US thinks they might be terrorists. If that were my name I would't take a holiday in Disney Land this year. If there is actually some nefarious person with that name they have now been alerted to the fact that the US is aware of them and has some interest in them.
Oh, and I like his style.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
(Score: 1) by EvilJim on Thursday February 27 2014, @12:48AM
My money is on these: http://au.element14.com/jsp/search/browse.jsp?N=21 01+202424&Ntk=gensearch&Ntt=explosion+proof+switch &Ntx=mode+matchallpartial [element14.com]