Microsoft are reportedly blocking employee internal work emails that contain the words “Palestine” or “Gaza”. The report in question comes from No Azure For Apartheid (NOAA), a group of Microsoft workers formed to protest the company’s then-alleged supplying of AI tech to the Israeli military – something Microsoft have since confirmed, while also stating that their own internal reviews found “no evidence to date that Microsoft’s Azure and AI technologies have been used to target or harm people in the conflict in Gaza.”
“NOAA believes this is an attempt by Microsoft to silence worker free speech and is a censorship enacted by Microsoft leadership to discriminate against Palestinian workers and their allies,” spokesperson and former Microsoft employee Hossam Nasr told The Verge (paywalled) in a statement. Nasr added that “words like ‘Israel’ or ‘P4lestine’ do not trigger such a block”.
When asked for comment by The Verge, Microsoft spokesperson Frank Shaw responded with the below:
“Emailing large numbers of employees about any topic not related to work is not appropriate. We have an established forum for employees who have opted in to political issues. Over the past couple of days, a number of politically focused emails have been sent to tens of thousands of employees across the company and we have taken measures to try and reduce those emails to those that have not opted in.”
As The Verge note, the reported email blocks follow a week of employee protests about the company’s dealings with the Israeli military. There have also been protests during Microsoft’s Build developer conference this week. On Monday, former employee Joe Lopez interrupted CEO Satya Nadella’s keynote by shouting “how about you show Israeli war crimes are powered by Azure?”, before sending emails to “thousands” of colleagues. Microsoft fired Lopez on the same day.
The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement are currently calling on the public to boycott Microsoft’s wares, including Xbox products like Game Pass. The BDS organisers include Nasr and Abdo Mohamed, another former Microsoft employee. They were both fired after organising a vigil for Palestinians killed in Gaza outside the company’s Washington HQ.