TORONTO, CANADA --- Several websites belonging to the government of Syria are being hosted by servers in the United States and Canada, according to a report by Canadian researchers.
The report says the operations raise legal questions because they may violate Canadian and U.S. sanctions against Syria. Syria has used police and military forces for the past eight months to put down a popular uprising.
Ronald Deibert, director of the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, said Thursday several Syrian websites — including the ministries of finance, economy and trade, and religious affairs — are hosted on U.S.-based servers. The report says 17 Syrian government websites are hosted by Canadian companies.
Deibert says his group had a moral obligation to report the operations given the violence in Syria.
