Thank you for that question.
You're absolutely right. There has actually been some excellent reporting done by The Wall Street Journal, Reuters, and Bloomberg, in open sources over the past couple of years detailing international companies that are selling tools of electronic repression to the Iranian regime. I would be delighted to provide you with a detailed, well-footnoted report that we have. We haven't publicly released it yet, but we would certainly provide it to the committee. It contains specific names, dates, and technologies that have been transferred.
I would also underscore that there is an opportunity to complement what Canada did yesterday. Canada yesterday essentially imposed a trade embargo on Iran, but provided specific exceptions for technology that would help Iranians challenge what President Obama has called Iran's electronic curtain. That is the positive side of technology—our ability to provide technology to the Iranian people to help them circumvent this electronic repression.
The other side of it is for Canada, under SEMA, to specifically sanction any Canadian person involved in providing tools of repression—electronic tools of repression—to the Iranian regime. Canada has a robust software and telecom industry, including in this town, and it's absolutely imperative that these sophisticated tracking and targeting technologies sold by western companies for police-enforcement purposes to reputable police forces around the world—which are subject to due process, warrants, and checks and balances—not be sold to the Iranian regime. Selling it to any element of that regime means that the regime will use that technology to specifically target dissidents for murder, torture, and unjust imprisonment.
So, absolutely, I will follow up and send you a very detailed report naming the exact companies involved in this.