By: Brooke Driver
On March 6, OFAC announced that the San Jose, California based company Ubiquiti Networks, Inc. has agreed to settle for $504,225 over its apparent violations of the Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations. The company was accused of violating the ITSR between the dates of March 24, 2008 and February 2010 by both directly and indirectly supplying goods for broadband wireless connectivity to Iran and approving the reexportation of these goods to Iran through a United Arab Emirates provider. Ubiquiti again appears to have violated the ITSR during the period of December 1, 2009 to February 25, 2011 by engaging in 13 exports of goods related to broadband wireless connectivity to a Greek distributer, despite the fact that Ubiquiti had knowledge or reason to believe that the goods were intended for an Iranian customer.
Although OFAC chose to lower its required fine from the base penalty amount of $560,250, due to the facts that Ubiquiti had no prior sanctions history and had cooperated fully with the investigation, the Office of Foreign Assets Control did not reduce the penalty amount significantly, because:
- Ubiquiti demonstrated reckless disregard for US sanctions
- Ubiquiti was on notice in February 2010 that the conduct in question was a violation of US law
- Ubiquiti senior management had knowledge or reason to know in both instances that their products were intended for reexportation to Iran
- Ubiquiti’s conduct resulted in the provision of goods related to broadband wireless connectivity to Iranian entities
- The period of violation lasted over five years
- Ubiquiti had no OFAC compliance program in place
