I’ve seen this Iranian engineer myth perpetuated ad nauseum on every social network for the last 24 hours and never before that, as if a desperate attempt to repaint the country as anything but a failed state. The reality is that Iran has been propped up by China and Russia for decades and has wasted all of its incoming capital on weapons and kickbacks rather than doing anything to boost its domestic situation.

Having lived in the U.S. my entire life, I’ve worked closely with many Iranian-born and -educated mathematicians, computer scientists, and software engineers. To OP’s point, I’ve never encountered anyone from Saudi Arabia in those fields.

Just because you didn't know something until 24 hours ago does not make it a myth.