“I want to let you know that Microsoft has ceased and disabled a set of services to a unit within the Israel Ministry of Defense (IMOD). I know many of you care about this topic, and I share more about this decision below. Let me first provide some context. As I’ve said to you in recent weeks, Microsoft is not a government or a country. We are a company. Like every company, we decide what products and services to offer to our customers,” writes Microsoft President Brad Smith in a new blog post.
“As we publicly announced on August 15, we decided to undertake a review of allegations that appeared in an article published on August 6 by The Guardian about a unit of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). As we explained at that time, The Guardian article reported that ‘multiple individuals have asserted that the IDF is using Azure for the storage of data files of phone calls obtained through broad or mass surveillance of civilians in Gaza and the West Bank.’ We have reviewed The Guardian’s allegations based on two principles, both grounded in Microsoft’s longstanding protection of privacy as a fundamental right. As employees, we all have a shared interest in privacy protection, given the business value it creates by ensuring our customers can rely on our services with rock solid trust,” Smith continued in the better late than never update.
It’s not clear how they notified the Israelis but one can always speculate…
