Microsoft blocks Israel’s use of its tech in mass surveillance of Palestinians

Did the protestors help the media publicity?

I really wonder if a company like microsoft has any real concern over people tweeting negative things about it. It seems like companies are finally realizing a lot of it can just be ignored, but with microsoft specifically, what’s the risk? Who in a position to deny ms enough money that they’d care or even notice is going to decide to do it based on people protesting?

The problem here is thinking that the only form of protest anyone ever engages in is tweeting things. Some people stop supporting companies they disagree with, both individually and, if they're able, with their own company.

Yes, unfortunately this is what happens when you have people who are constantly critical of Microsoft based on what they know of the company from the 90s and 00s, it devalues genuine modern criticisms and makes all criticism meaningless.

You are right that with the Trump administration (well, bipartisan support), US companies don't have to worry about any adverse political action by cooperating with Israel. Negative publicity from the common people also won't adversely affect their bottom line. But they do have to worry about the legal aspects - the US is one of the few countries actually having laws against genocide / war crimes. Trump may be ready to bomb the Hague and the ICC, but we know he can't bomb US courts for any similar proceedings against any US or foreign firms ...

But that’s my point - who will do that? Who is going to go to their company’s CEO and convince them to put in the massive amount of effort to switch cloud providers? Who is going to say “I don’t think we should use Teams anymore” and actually be able to switch to something else? I have no idea if microsoft even cares about retail customers anymore, but are there really enough people who are going to boycott microsoft products (I honestly don’t know what those products even are) over this?

I just don’t think they have anything to worry about. I personally think it’s good what they’re doing here, but I guess I’m too cynical to believe they are doing it out of the goodness of their hearts, and I don’t think the real reason is that they’re worried about bad publicity.

Not just some people - a lot of people, and an increasing amount of people in the last year or so, including whole countries like Ireland, Spain and Slovenia. See the BDS movement/website/Facebook pages. As a lifelong Windows user I've been seriously considering moving to a Linux distro for my next desktop. I'll need to dig into the news some more, but this decision more than likely means I can stick with Windows.

Trying to pin support for israel on one side and not on the entirety of the us government at all levels is either profoundly naive or profoundly dishonest.

I can't speak to Microsoft specifically, but bad press has certainly hurt other similar companies (eg Meta) when it comes to hiring.

BDS is also about as formidable as a boycott movement gets.

> Who is going to go to their company’s CEO and convince them to put in the massive amount of effort to switch cloud providers?

Surely if any movement leads to this, it's BDS, likely the most popular and widely-known boycott since before the end of South African apartheid.

They even appear to have a page and a visualization devoted to compiling publicly visible impacts: https://bdsmovement.net/our-impact

Some people like me are running a company and are still picking out their tech stack. I don't like Microsoft, and that absolutely affects how likely I am to use their services. My situation might not be that common but PR surely still matters some.

> this is what happens when you have people who are constantly critical of Microsoft based on what they know of the company from the 90s and 00s

There are more than a couple of us who have Office or Teams imposed on us. There is plenty to complain about that is current and most definitely valid.

> are there really enough people who are going to boycott microsoft products

Maybe not, but some is better than none, and I'll continue to push more people to do it, rather than tell them nothing they do matters.

> over this?

Maybe it's not just this. Maybe this is the straw that breaks the user's back. Or maybe the next thing is.

My point was to address your belief that they're too big for anyone to make any difference. That isn't true, and the belief that you or any other citizen can't make a difference is their biggest advantage.

(I put this last because I know what HN will say to this, but: are CEOs and other executives not people too? Can they not make principled moves either?)

> the US is one of the few countries actually having laws against genocide / war crimes.

Yet the US does not allow prosecutions in the international criminal court.

How do you explain Mai Lai what went on more recently in Afghanistan and Iraq.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_and_the_Intern...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_war_crimes

Have you used a modern Microsoft OS? They are somehow worse than they were in the 90s and 00s. I don’t remember having to agree to sell my personal information in the 90s or having advertising baked into the start menu in windows xp.

> (I put this last because I know what HN will say to this, but: are CEOs and other executives not people too? Can they not make principled moves either?)

Not sure what you mean by "what HN will say to this", but for me the answer is clear - they are, they can, and they often do. As do their employees - or at least they push in the direction which is better aligned with their values.

"Software with slightly worse UX than the competing products" is not an ethical concern.

> Not sure what you mean by "what HN will say to this"

I fully expect some form of cynical "No" as an answer.

I originally had phrased it, "Are CEOs not humans too?" which might make it clearer what I expected :P

You know a boycott movement is effective when Israel has tens of lobbies like the IAF that are dedicated entirely to passing legislation to make it illegal. Germany has already passed it and the UK is unfortunately looking very close.

> BDS is also about as formidable as a boycott movement gets.

Barely gotten started.

This is what made the difference in South Africa, but the boycotts were much bigger

Amazon, Google and Oracle will have to boycott too. I am boycotting them

Well, Biden was claiming that "there is no genocide" while approving the building of (future) concentration camps for the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, while Trump is worried only about the "optics" but is fine as long as a "beautiful resort is finally built in Gaza", after herding the Palestinians into these new "refugee centres" (i.e. the concentration camps) and from there to Egypt (who has been promised to be made the future gas hub for Europe) to complete Israeli occupation of Gaza. I'll leave it to you to decide whether I am being naive or dishonest or who planned the genocide and who is complicit in it - Here's the "propaganda" sources based on which I am making these assertions:

1. Trump criticizes Israel for releasing photos and videos of its devastating war in Gaza - https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-criticizes-israels-pho...

2. Trump ruthless take on Israel's war on Gaza: 'Finish the problem' - https://www.newarab.com/news/trump-israels-war-gaza-finish-p...

3. Satellite photos show Egypt building Gaza wall as Israel’s Rafah push looms - https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/2/16/satellite-photos-sh...

4. Israel’s plan to build Gaza ‘concentration camps’ was rolled out months ago - https://mondoweiss.net/2025/07/israels-plan-to-build-gaza-co...

5. Trump’s Gaza takeover all about natural gas - https://asiatimes.com/2025/02/trumps-gaza-takeover-all-about...

I agree that in-OS advertising for a paid product is dumb, but a) I thankfully still use Windows 10 which doesn't have those, and b) those are ultimately UX concerns, not ethical. And no, Microsoft doesn't sell your data no matter how many in tech subscribe to that conspiracy theory.

That's fair. For the record, I recently dumped windows for linux and won't ever buy/use a microsoft product again if I can help it, and I will encourage others to do the same, but that decision had nothing to do with politics.

I don't think I actually disagree with anything you've said. I am just very cynical, and while I want to believe like you do, I find it very difficult.

edit: "Can they not make principled moves either?" - Yeah, they _could_, but does that _ever_ happen at companies as big as microsoft?

Don't worry, so do I :)

Last time I installed windows 11 in a VM I had to agree to at least 3, possibly more, un-skippable Eulas that required me to agree to share my personal information. Maybe they aren’t selling it outside of MS, but MS is such a giant company if they are using it for ads I don’t see the distinction.

The distinction is consent, and it's a pretty big one, because it's the difference between Microsoft sharing it among their services (they don't need to sell it to themselves) for the reasons outlined in the EULAs, and companies that aren't Microsoft using it for whatever reason they want. You can be assured they're following the EULAs because the consequences of not doing so would make them vulnerable to millions if not billions in fines if only one sufficiently motivated individual, like an ex-employee, leaked the evidence. More targeted (i.e. relevant) ads are really not the evil many make them out to be. Ads in a paid product are also not quite evil, but they are incredibly idiotic and a step backwards. Either way, makes no difference to me because at this rate it seems my next OS will be a Windows-like Linux distro anyway.

I appreciate the nuanced and intelligent analysis of the situation. Admittedly I haven’t thought about it very deeply because as it appears you agree Linux has made operating systems commodity at this point, at least to moderately technical users, so I really see no benefit to using any MS OS at this point.