CompTIA Submits Report on Foreign Barriers to Tech Trade

On October 27, CompTIA submitted a report to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative as it works to compile the annual National Trade Estimate (NTE) on foreign barriers to trade. CompTIA used this opportunity to provide the federal government with information on the foreign barriers member companies face when exporting their products and services. A top concern is an escalating practice called “data localization” whereby foreign governments require technology service providers to process and store data domestically, at great expense to U.S. companies. Our members are seeing this trend in countries such as China, Turkey, Indonesia, Japan and Korea.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which CompTIA is advocating for Congressional passage of in the lame duck, would prevent the 12 governments in the agreement from imposing this measure. Other areas of concern raised by member companies include the alarming trend of foreign governments shutting down domestic Internet or mobile services and unreasonable local testing and certification requirements of certain ICT products. CompTIA works to combat these barriers on behalf of member companies.

Additional barriers can be found in the full report available here.