The National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) has said that its national core technology list prevents foreign actors from stealing trade secrets, after a former US Department of Commerce official raised concerns about Taiwan’s export controls.
Kim Mi-yong, former chair of the Operating Committee for Export Administration at the US Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), said at a forum on “techno-geopolitics” last week that there was a “discrepancy in the verbiage” between Taiwan’s Foreign Trade Act (貿易法) and its list of “national core key technologies” published in December last year.
Kim said that while the core technology list talks about protecting “key technologies,” the act, which implements export controls and requires permits from exporters, only oversees the flow of strategic high-tech “commodities” without mentioning how the export of “technologies” is regulated.
Photo: Wu Po-hsuan, Taipei Times
The list of 22 protected technologies announced by the NSTC in December spanned five sectors: defense, space, agriculture, semiconductors and information security.
Controlled semiconductor technologies are those more advanced than the mature 14-nanometer process technology and advanced IC packaging and testing technologies, such as processes involving silicon photonics integration development and related specialty chemicals, raw materials and equipment, the council said.
Asked by the Central News Agency for comment, the council on Friday said that the list aims to “strengthen the trade secrets of national core technologies, preventing them from being illegally disclosed to foreign countries, which could result in violations of national and industrial interests.”
“Trade secrets that are found to be illegally obtained by foreign entities would be investigated by prosecutors,” the council said.
The council said that the list is to “protect trade secrets by aggravating the punishment of the contraventions” and “does not affect enterprises’ existing commercial activities and collaborations.”
In other words, there is no pre-export review or implementation of controls regarding these technologies.
“Export controls are about obtaining government authentication before exporting,” Kim said.
However, in Taiwan’s case, while “technology to develop, produce or use controlled commodities is on the [national core key technology] list of controlled items, Taiwan does not review such technology exports because the Foreign Trade Act references only controls on commodities,” she said.
Kim said US export controls are an example to be followed, adding that its export control list has 10 broad categories, and each category is further subdivided into five product groups, of which “technology” is specifically singled out as a group.
Jeremy Chang (張智程), director of the semiconductor industrial policy research unit of Research Institute for Democracy, Society and Energy Technology, said that Taiwan’s National Security Act (國家安全法), the foundational law for its core technology list, is not about export controls, but only aimed at “strengthening the legal actions against economic spies that infringe private enterprises’ trade secrets.”
“This is really different from how the US, Europe and Japan have been making adjustments to their laws to build up their strength to oversee their core technologies, infrastructure and supply chain after 2018,” he said.
Former Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) research and development director Konrad Young (楊光磊) said that he believed the limited export controls benefited Taiwanese companies to a great extent, which is why the government has been reluctant to make changes.
“If it were up to the companies, the US would not have imposed export controls,” Kim said.
While the government has to consider companies’ concerns, “at the end of the day, the government’s job is to take care of national security, not the companies’ interests,” she said.
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