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Big Tech terror: For Palestinians, AI apocalypse is already here
Despite Silicon Valley and Big Tech's promise to create technologies that improve our lives and make the world a better place, we have seen a sharp turn toward investment in weaponised technologies, exacerbating violence and death, as big tech firms chase lucrative contracts within the military-industrial complex.
This transition has been happening for quite some time now, but nowhere is it clearer than in the occupation of Palestine.
For years, Palestine has been used as a “laboratory” by Israeli surveillance technology firms.
These companies, often started by former Israeli intelligence officers, leverage relationships within the Israeli military to deploy and test their devices across the occupied Palestinian territories before marketing them as “field-tested” to authoritarian and repressive regimes worldwide.
This phenomenon, which 7amleh and other human rights defenders have documented for years, has recently gained wider attention thanks to the critically acclaimed journalist Antony Loewenstein’s book The Palestine Laboratory.
Numerous infamous examples of this ecosystem have surfaced in recent years. In 2020, AnyVision, a facial recognition company with surveillance cameras across the West Bank, received millions of dollars in investment from Microsoft.
However, the company came under scrutiny for its negative human rights impacts. After an intense pressure campaign involving civil society and Microsoft employees, Microsoft decided to divest from AnyVision.
Today, AnyVision has rebranded itself as Oosta but continues implementing harmful technologies with negative human rights implications.
Perhaps an even more well-known example is the NSO Group and its infamous Pegasus software. This “zero-click” technology can hack into a phone and access all files and data, including pictures, messages, and call history.
Even scarier, Pegasus can control phones remotely, activating the microphone and camera at any time for live video and audio surveillance. This software was found on the phones of Palestinian civil society leaders, human rights defenders, and journalists throughout Latin America, and even French President Macron was targeted.
For Big Tech, funding Israeli apartheid and occupation is profitable
In the case of Pegasus, uncommonly strong action was taken due to the severe and globally felt harm the software caused. In the fall of 2021, the Biden administration blacklisted NSO Group, effectively barring the company from doing business with U.S.-based entities.
AnyVision and NSO Group are important examples of the diminishing space between the tech industry and weapons manufacturing for a couple of reasons.
First, both are clear examples of advanced technology being used to create and sell weapons incompatible with globally recognised human rights norms. Second, both cases follow the false narrative of “a few bad actors.”
The tech industry has stood behind this false narrative for far too long. Those who have been paying attention are likely familiar with the cases of NSO Group, as well as Palantir, and Elbit Systems — companies with terrible track records for creating and selling technologies incompatible with human rights.
These companies are the rightful targets of criticism; however, focusing so heavily on the most explicit bad actors has allowed much of big tech to escape scrutiny.
In the United States, there is essentially no regulation on mass surveillance technologies. Whenever action is taken, it is always a piecemeal, “bad actor” approach, targeting and blacklisting specific companies rather than implementing sector-wide, comprehensive regulation.
This is exactly what happened with NSO Group, and it is particularly problematic, as research published by 7amleh shows that Silicon Valley venture capitalists are some of the biggest investors in the Israeli mass surveillance sector.
Even in Europe, where the European Parliament has pushed for more regulation of big tech than any other elected body, recent efforts have fallen short.
The EU AI Act, a first-of-its-kind regulation on AI technologies, created many important legal safeguards for companies developing and selling technologies within the European Union.
However, European companies do not have to abide by these regulations if they are selling technologies outside Europe. This loophole means European companies can sell weaponised, AI-driven technologies to Israel for use in its ongoing genocidal military campaign against Palestinians without violating the EU AI Act.
This lack of regulation and piecemeal approach to combating harmful technologies has greatly benefited big tech. The situation in Gaza is a clear illustration of this.
Nearly ten months into Israel’s genocidal military campaign, which has at least 39,000 lives (likely many more), we have witnessed an unprecedented level of death and destruction, made possible by a suite of automated technologies supported by big tech.
Israel’s horrific bombing campaign on Gaza has been powered by AI. Secret Israeli programs like Where’s Daddy, The Gospel, and Lavender utilize facial recognition, geolocating, and cloud computing to create kill lists and bombing targets at an astonishing rate. Deemed the first “AI-assisted genocide,” these systems allow for bombings to be ordered with little human involvement, leading to staggering levels of civilian casualties.
Without the support of cloud computing from Google, Amazon, and Microsoft, Israel would never have been able to power its killing machine. Employees at Google and Amazon have been raising the alarm on this issue for years, and more recently, Microsoft workers have joined the fight.
Tech CEOs would like you to believe that massive contracts with governments like Israel (or the United States) do not contribute to violence or grave violations of human rights. Google CEO Sundar Pichai even claimed that Google’s AI would not be used for weapons.
However, last March, nearly six months into Israel’s genocidal campaign, Google expanded its contract with Israel, explicitly billing the Ministry of Defense $1 million in consulting fees to improve access to automated technologies.
Through the proliferation of automated weapons technologies and their deep reliance on cloud computing, big tech is thoroughly invested in weapons manufacturing.
The atrocious situation in Gaza lays bare just how much the tech industry is profiting from death and destruction. Listen to the thousands of workers speaking out, not only at Amazon, Google, and Microsoft but also at Oracle and Meta, with more groups continuously coming forward.
We must hold big tech accountable for the harm it has caused. We can only do so by acknowledging the industry's connection to weapons manufacturing and war profiteering. Justice and accountability for Palestinians demand this. Moreover, it is incumbent upon us to ensure that there are no more “AI-assisted genocides” and that the fate of Gaza is not replicated against other oppressed communities.
Eric Sype is a Community Organizer and Advocate for Palestinian Human Rights. He is 7amleh’s National Organizer in the United States and works to build a broad base of support for Palestinian Digital Rights within the US.
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Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The New Arab, its editorial board or staff.