Microsoft President Brad Smith, left, speaks at a press convention on future visions for the event and software of synthetic intelligence in training in North Rhine-Westphalia on the Representation of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia in Berlin on June 4, 2025. To his proper is Hendrik Wüst (CDU), Minister President of North Rhine-Westphalia, in entrance of the signal “From coal to AI.”
Soeren Stache | Picture Alliance | Getty Images
Microsoft mentioned Thursday that it has stopped offering sure services to a division of the Israeli Ministry of Defense. The firm didn’t say which particular services it had stopped offering.
The resolution comes after the software program firm investigated an August report from The Guardian saying the Israeli Defense Forces’ Unit 8200 had constructed a system for monitoring Palestinians’ telephone calls.
“While our review is ongoing, we have found evidence that supports elements of The Guardian’s reporting,” Brad Smith, Microsoft’s president and vice chair, wrote in an email to employees. “This evidence includes information relating to IMOD consumption of Azure storage capacity in the Netherlands and the use of AI services.”
Microsoft’s resolution to cease offering these services follows strain from workers who’ve protested Israel’s use of the corporate’s firm’s software program as a part of its invasion of Gaza. Over the previous few weeks, Microsoft has fired five employees who participated in protests at firm headquarters in Redmond, Washington.
The transfer comes every week after a United Nations commission said that Israel has dedicated genocide towards Palestinians with its invasion of Gaza.
Microsoft advised Israeli protection officers that it had determined to disable cloud-based storage a man-made intelligence subscriptions the company was utilizing, Smith wrote. He mentioned Microsoft doesn’t take a look at buyer knowledge for the kind of overview it performed, and he thanked the British newspaper for its reporting on the event.
“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 wrote.
On Thursday The Guardian reported that unnamed intelligence sources had mentioned Unit 8200 was planning to migrate its provide of the telephone calls to Amazon Web Services, the market-leading public cloud. AWS didn’t instantly remark.
