The US Army and Microsoft recently entered in to a contract worth over $479 million dollars for an “integrated Visual Augmented System” with the HoloLens, but it turns out that not everybody is onboard with the latest deal.
The deal was pushed back in November, but a recent “HoloLens for Good, not War” letter sent up to CEO Satya Nadella and President Brad Smith details exactly why these employees are resisting the advancement of this deal.
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On behalf of workers at Microsoft, we’re releasing an open letter to Brad Smith and Satya Nadella, demanding for the cancelation of the IVAS contract with a call for stricter ethical guidelines.
— Microsoft Workers 4 Good (@MsWorkers4) February 22, 2019
If you’re a Microsoft employee you can sign at: //t.co/958AhvIHO5 pic.twitter.com/uUZ5P4FJ7X
The above letter states, “We are alarmed that Microsoft is working to provide weapons technology to the US Military, helping one’s government “increase lethality” using tools we built. We did not sign up to develop weapons, and we demand a say in how our work is used.”
The letter then goes into a list of demands for the execs in charge of this deal:
- Cancel the IVAS contract
- Cease developing any and all weapons technologies, and draft a public-facing acceptable use policy clarifying this commitment
- Appoint an independent, external ethics review board with the power to enforce and publicly validate compliance with its acceptable use policy
The letter then goes on to detail the deal’s progression and how the participating employees feel about the guidelines of accessibility and forced participation. They added, “Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and organization on the planet to do more. But implicit in that statement, we believe it is also Microsoft’s mission to empower every person and organization on the planet to do good.”
In a report from The Guardian, over 50 employees are a part of this protest, with more pledging their support as time goes on. Though Microsoft in the past has defended the deal, with the growing number of disgruntled employees, it will be interesting to see how the execs react.
H/T PC Gamer
