One of the world’s largest software companies, Microsoft, has announced that it will sell its stake in the controversial Israeli facial recognition start-up company AnyVision. This follows allegations that the company’s software was part of a ‘mass surveillance project’ of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank by the Israeli army through its vast labyrinth of military checkpoints, the Israel newspaper Haaretz reported on Sunday, March 29, 2020.
An investigative news report in October 2019 by US-based television news channel NBC had found that the Israeli company, AnyVision, was enabling human rights abuses in the West Bank by letting its technology be used for scanning the faces of the thousands of Palestinians crossing Israeli military checkpoints every day. Microsoft’s M12 venture arm had invested USD 74 million in AnyVision in June 2019. Following the revelation, human rights organizations and Palestine solidarity activists began a campaign, demanding that Microsoft divest from the company, in accordance with not only international law but also with Microsoft’s own principles governing its development and use of facial recognition technology.
After the NBC report, Microsoft launched an audit of the Israeli firm, hiring former US attorney general Eric Holder. On Friday, the company announced that it would divest from the Israeli firm due to lack of ethical unambiguity and oversight. The company also announced its decision to stop investing in facial recognition technology companies in the future.
The announcement was welcomed by Palestine solidarity activists and human rights organizations. The international campaign to demand Microsoft divestment from AnyVision, in a statement, said, “This is a huge and sorely needed victory at a time when corporations and governments have begun to use COVID-19 as an excuse to violate human rights.” It also noted the fact that this win is especially meaningful and important owing to the fact that it comes against such a prominent, internationally known, massive corporation.
