Hundreds of Google employees on Wednesday
called on the internet titan to avoid working for US immigration
officials until they stop "engaging in human rights abuses."
A petition signed by more than 600 "Googlers" as of late afternoon was
prompted by word that US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) was
preparing to request bids on a massive cloud computing contract.
Google is a major cloud computing provider. Its rivals in the market included Amazon and Microsoft.
"The winning cloud provider will be streamlining CBP's infrastructure
and facilitating its human rights abuses," a copy of the petition posted
on medium.com said.
"It's time to stand together again and state clearly that we will not work on any such contract."
Google did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
The petition demanded that the Silicon Valley-based company publicly
commit not to support Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Office of
Refugee Resettlement, and CBP.
By providing technology support to those agencies in the current
climate, Google would be "trading its integrity for a bit of profit, and
joining a shameful lineage," the petition argued.
"History is clear: the time to say 'NO' is now," the petition read.
"We refuse to be complicit."
Those who signed the petition argued that it would be "unconscionable"
for any tech company supporting those agencies given current practices
at the US southern border.
Google last year dropped out of the bidding for a huge Pentagon cloud
computing contract that could be worth up to $10 billion after a protest
by employees urging the company to stay out of the business of war.
In recent years, Google employees have challenged the company on issues
including sexual harassment in the workplace and the potential tailoring
of a version of its online search engine for use on China's heavily
censored internet.
https://www.geezgo.com/sps/59669
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