BIS publishes correction to Administrative and Enforcement Provisions final rule (15 CFR 764.5)

Mechanism

15 CFR 764.5 governs voluntary self-disclosure (VSD) procedures for violations of the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) — the route through which exporters report potential EAR violations to BIS Office of Export Enforcement (OEE) and receive mitigation credit. BIS's September 2024 final rule (RIN 0694-AJ84) was a substantive update to administrative and enforcement provisions across 15 CFR 764, including revisions to VSD treatment, penalty calibration, and settlement procedures.

The October 2024 correction is a clerical fix: instruction No. 2 of the parent rule had stated that paragraph (b) of 15 CFR 764.5 was being revised, when in fact the revisions targeted paragraphs (a), (c), (d), (e), and (f), with a new paragraph (g) added. Paragraph (b) — which defines what constitutes "concealment of activities" disqualifying for mitigation — was unchanged. The correction does not alter any substantive obligation, penalty, or process; it only clarifies which paragraphs of the regulation the parent rule edited.

Downstream implications

• No compliance impact — exporters following the corrected text of 15 CFR

764.5 see no change in obligation.

• Filed primarily for register completeness: the parent rule (89 FR 75477,

RIN 0694-AJ84) is the substantive instrument and should be queued for separate filing if/when prioritised. This entry exists to flag that the EAR voluntary self-disclosure/enforcement architecture was materially revised in September 2024 — a clerical artefact of which surfaces here.

Open questions

• Should the underlying parent rule (RIN 0694-AJ84, 16 Sep 2024) be queued

for separate filing as a substantive BIS enforcement-architecture update? The Sep-2024 rule revised VSD procedures, penalty schedules, and settlement options across 15 CFR 764 — potentially material for exporter compliance-cost calibration.