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Tell Microsoft: Drop AnyVision, the surveillance company spying on West Bank Palestinians
https://dropanyvision.org/?emci=a9dcecd5-aef9-e911-828b-
2818784d6d68&emdi=4d5ed40b-b7f9-e911-828b-2818784d6d68&ceid=67625

TELL MICROSOFT:
#DROPANYVISION
SIGN THE PETITION
This June, Microsoft made a multi-million dollar investment in AnyVision, an
Israeli facial recognition company led by former Israeli military and
intelligence personnel.
Eylon Etshtein Co-founder and CEO Ex-Commando Recon Unit, Israeli Defense
Forces
Eylon Etshtein
Co-founder and CEO
Ex-Commando Recon Unit, Israeli Defense Forces


Eylon Etshtein Co-founder and CEO Ex-Commando Recon Unit, Israeli Defense
Forces
Eylon Etshtein
Co-founder and CEO
Ex-Commando Recon Unit, Israeli Defense Forces

Amir Kain President Former head of Malmab, the Israeli Defense Ministry’s
security department
Amir Kain
President
Former head of Malmab, the Israeli Defense Ministry’s security department

Tamir Paro Advisor Former head of Mossad, the Israeli national intelligence
agency
Tamir Paro
Advisor
Former head of Mossad, the Israeli national intelligence agency

While AnyVision claims their technology helps streamline the operations of
West Bank checkpoints — which thousands of Palestinians must pass through
everyday to work or visit their families — human rights activists have
voiced serious concerns. Amos Toh, a senior researcher on artificial
intelligence at Human Rights Watch, told Forbes that the use of such
technology in the “very fraught political context” of the Israeli-occupied
West Bank could be problematic and requires “special considerations of
discrimination.”

Even more alarming than AnyVision’s checkpoint biometrics is a second
project that reportedly “includes facial recognition technology elsewhere in
the West Bank, not just at border crossings.” According to Haaretz, “Cameras
deep inside the West Bank try to spot and monitor potential Palestinian
assailants.”


Young men from Kober, a West Bank village, find a video camera that was
hidden in a cemetery by Israeli security forces. In a statement to the
Jerusalem Post, AnyVision said they were “not involved with the device that
appears in the YouTube video.`

Presented with the argument that mass surveillance is being carried out in a
territory that is not governed democratically, AnyVision CEO Etshtein told
Haaretz: “It’s really a huge dilemma, but I’m not the guy to ask this.
Ultimately we’re a technology company that does the maximum so that its
technology isn’t misused.”

But if AnyVision is field-testing their technology on Palestinians who live
under military occupation and therefore have no choice in the matter, is
that not “misuse”?

Meanwhile, Microsoft’s decision to fund AnyVision appears to violate all
“six principles for developing and deploying facial recognition technology”
that the corporation very publicly committed to in 2018.

If Microsoft wants to continue portraying itself as “the [tech] industry’s
moral conscience,” why is it funding a company whose technology is
reportedly used to surveil an occupied people?
AnyVision’s use of facial recognition technology most glaringly conflicts
with Microsoft’s sixth principle of “lawful surveillance”:

We will advocate for safeguards for people’s democratic freedoms in law
enforcement surveillance scenarios and will not deploy facial recognition
technology in scenarios that we believe will put these freedoms at risk.

Palestinians under Israeli military occupation do not enjoy democratic
freedoms — and AnyVision’s technology only further limits their right to
privacy and freedom of movement.

Until Palestinians have equality, justice, and dignity, corporations like
Microsoft should stop investing in technology developed to surveil them and
control their movement.
Join Jewish Voice for Peace and partner MPower Change in calling on
Microsoft to #DropAnyVision.


https://secure.everyaction.com/JCZWsJRwukKJqFL_Eh35zw2?ms=top-
nav&sourceid=1000457

To: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella

I urge you to cut all Microsoft investment in AnyVision, which is actively
helping the Israeli government set up a surveillance system to monitor
Palestinians` every move. You recently said Microsoft has to translate its
ethical Artificial Intelligence principles into its everyday work. This is
your chance to make good on that commitment.
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