April 2024 - nexa - server-nexa.polito.it

[CDT:Lmenouno] German BSI warns: Critical vulnerabilities in (not updated) Exchange servers. (aka Internet of Broken Things)
by 380° April 14, 2024

April 14, 2024

Buongiorno, la questione è stata portata alla mia attenzione da un recente intervento di Antonio [1] in lista, che ringrazio. Executive summary: il 5 Marzo BSI ha emanato un comunicato stampa (e una relazione PDF in DE) perché ha trovato via Shodan [2] che decine di migliaia (17K secondo i ben informati) di server MS Excange non sono ancora stati aggiornati con aggiornamenti di sicurezza critici. Sarà mica una novità? Sapete quante notizie o ricerche si possono confezionare grazie a Shodan in merito a quanti dispositivi server, router e "IoT" connessi a internet sono vulnerabili a qualche "attacco NON zero-day" (di cui è disponibile la "patch")? Beh se non lo sapevate, *sapetelo*: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=shodan+discovered+vulnerable+devices&ia=web «Critical vulnerabilities in Exchange servers» https://www.bsi.bund.de/EN/Themen/Unternehmen-und-Organisationen/Informatio… --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- According to the IT service provider Shodan, tens of thousands of Exchange servers in Germany were vulnerable to attack via the Internet and are very likely already infected with malware. This situation affects companies and organisations of all sizes. The BSI recommends installing the security updates provided by Microsoft without delay. Vulnerable Exchange systems should be checked for relevant anomalies as a matter of urgency due to the high risk of attack. You will find a BSI cyber security warning containing information and measures for dealing with these vulnerabilitie: [Microsoft Exchange Schwachstellen Detektion und Reaktion]. The relevant information is continually updated on the BSI website. [Microsoft Exchange Schwachstellen Detektion und Reaktion] </SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/BSI/Cyber-Sicherheit/Vorfaelle/Exchange-Schwachstellen-2021/MSExchange_Schwachstelle_Detektion_Reaktion.pdf?__blob=publicationFile&v=6> Additional information: ─────────────────────── [Press releases from the BSI - 5. März 2021] [Recording of the BSI-Livestream "Informationen und Hilfestellungen" - 11. März 2021 on YouTube] [Further information and links, including external support services] [Press releases from the BSI - 5. März 2021] <file:DE/Service-Navi/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/Presse2021/210305_Exchange-Schwachstelle.html?nn=1010128> [Recording of the BSI-Livestream "Informationen und Hilfestellungen" - 11. März 2021 on YouTube] <https://youtu.be/QcqRRc-VoB0> [Further information and links, including external support services] <file:DE/IT-Sicherheitsvorfall/Unternehmen/unternehmen_node.html> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- Loving, 380° [1] https://server-nexa.polito.it/pipermail/nexa/2024-April/052462.html [2] https://www.shodan.io/ «Shodan is the world's first search engine for Internet-connected devices. Discover how Internet intelligence can help you make better decisions.» see also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shodan_(website) -- 380° (Giovanni Biscuolo public alter ego) «Noi, incompetenti come siamo, non abbiamo alcun titolo per suggerire alcunché» Disinformation flourishes because many people care deeply about injustice but very few check the facts. Ask me about <https://stallmansupport.org>.

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Guida autonoma
by Diego Giorio April 14, 2024

April 14, 2024

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Google Contract Shows Deal With Israel Defense Ministry | TIME
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 12, 2024

April 12, 2024

https://time.com/6966102/google-contract-israel-defense-ministry-gaza-war/ (messaggio spedito in movimento - scusate brevità ed eventuali refusi)

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Disiscrizione
by Guildor April 12, 2024

April 12, 2024

Buongiorno, vorrei gentilmente disiscrivermi dalla mailing list, purtroppo il link per farlo in autonomia non sembra funzionare. Grazie

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[CDT:L3] The (Epistemological, n.d.r.) Enunciation Apocalypse (I said order lunch)
by 380° April 11, 2024

April 11, 2024

Buongiorno, un amico ha ricevuto "via social" (e mi ha girato via chat) una vignetta umoristica che ci è piaciuta molto, purtroppo senza il minimo riferimento all'origine. ...trovata! É del Maggio 2021, ma molto attuale: https://www.gocomics.com/nonsequitur/2021/05/24 [1] «Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller for May 24, 2021» Come corollario, ho trovato questa "notizia" del Giugno 2021 su una testata Indiana, che parte da un tweet di un importante politico indiano che rilancia una versione leggermente ritoccata della vignetta (che è quella che ho ricevuto io): https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/with-enunciation-apocalypse-sketch-tharoor-… «Shashi Tharoor's Word Of The Day For "Those Who Make Snarky Remarks..."» --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- In a tweet, Shashi Tharoor shared a cartoon, serving as a reminder why "enunciation" or pronouncing words clearly is important. [...] Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, known to amuse his Twitter followers with his fabulous vocabulary, this morning gave a cheeky response to those "who issue snarky remarks daily" about his diction. This is for all those who issue snarky remarks daily about my diction — a reminder of why enunciation *is* important! pic.twitter.com/VPKPHbz8cb — Shashi Tharoor (@ShashiTharoor) June 2, 2021 [2] Titled "The Enunciation Apocalypse", the cartoon shows some military personnel inside a monitoring station with large television screens hanging from the wall. One of them gives a command to Alexa, the voice-controlled virtual assistant. Asked to order "lunch", the device misunderstands and takes it for missile "launch". --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- Uno dei tweet di commento all'"articolo indiano" dice: --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- Its has happened to me while experimenting with NLP code. Luckily my code was not connected to nuclear missile but at times felt like system was hurling out profanity. [...] — Siddharth Savant (@siddhu92) June 2, 2021 [3] --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- "Luckily" :-D Giusto per contestualizzare il ragionamento, si tratta di "cosine" linguistiche per le quali non sarebbe sufficiente un convegno di tre giorni sulla fonetica: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Received_Pronunciation --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- The word 'received' conveys its original meaning of 'accepted' or 'approved', as in 'received wisdom'. --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- (si veda l'intero articolo) ... *combinate* con "cosine" _sistemistiche_ per le quali non sarebbe sufficiente un convegno di tre _settimane_ sulla robotica (_molto_ più multidisciplinare di quello sulla fonetica, perché si parte dall'ingegneria elettrotecnica e si finisce con la neurofisiologia, anzi no, con la _filosofia_): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_robot --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- a robot that acts without recourse to human control. The first autonomous robots environment were known as Elmer and Elsie, which were constructed in the late 1940s by W. Grey Walter. They were the first robots in history that were programmed to "think" the way biological brains do and meant to have free will. --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- Faccio sommessamente notare che Elmer e Elsie ("Machina speculatrix") furono costruite da un _neurobiologo_ che voleva dimostrare: --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- [...] that rich connections between a small number of brain cells could give rise to very complex behaviors - essentially that the secret of how the brain worked lay in how it was wired up [...] [...] Walter stressed the importance of using purely analogue electronics to simulate brain processes at a time when his contemporaries such as Alan Turing and John von Neumann were all turning towards a view of mental processes in terms of digital computation. --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- (rif. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Grey_Walter#Robots) Per favore andate voi a studiare in cosa consistevano Elmer e Elsie e in cosa consistono i robot autonomi del giorno d'oggi [4], non fatevelo raccontare da me. ...specialmente il senso dell'aggettivo "autonomo" in quel contesto, per favore. Mi fermo qui. Saluti, 380° [1] archiviata qui: https://web.archive.org/web/20210524063016/https://www.gocomics.com/nonsequ… e qui: https://archive.is/pHv3t [2] https://twitter.com/ShashiTharoor/status/1399950572170584067 [3] https://twitter.com/siddhu92/status/1399951954604789761 [4] oggi al 99,99% basati sulla visione "turinghiana" dei processi mentali in termini computazionali, perché i BEAM robot praticamente non esistono: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BEAM_robotics -- 380° (Giovanni Biscuolo public alter ego) «Noi, incompetenti come siamo, non abbiamo alcun titolo per suggerire alcunché» Disinformation flourishes because many people care deeply about injustice but very few check the facts. Ask me about <https://stallmansupport.org>.

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[CDT:L7] Il corpo come passaporto (by EDRI – European Digital Rights)
by 380° April 11, 2024

April 11, 2024

Buongiorno, le persone con il minimo sindacale di capacità di generalizzazione dei concetti non faranno fatica a sostituire mentalmente, nel pezzo che segue, i concetti "migranti", "rifugiati", "richiedenti asilo" [1] e "controllo dell'accoglienza" con "gruppo di persone X" e "controllo dei flussi (movimenti) [2] del gruppo di persone X" (ovviamente /sporche/ X). https://www.ilfattoquotidiano.it/2024/04/09/il-corpo-come-passaporto-lincub… «Il corpo come passaporto: l’incubo biometrico al centro del sistema di accoglienza dell’Ue".» Laurence Meyer e Chloé Berthélémy (EDRI – European Digital Rights) 9 Aprile 2024 --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- /Il prossimo 10 aprile, il *Parlamento europeo* darà il via libera definitivo al nuovo patto sulle migrazioni. All'interno del testo si prevede anche la riforma dell'*Eurodac*, il database utilizzato per la gestione dei flussi di persone ai confini: l'intervento prevede, tra le altre cose, l'abbassamento dell'età per la sorveglianza biometrica sui migranti da 14 a 6 anni/. /Riceviamo e pubblichiamo l'analisi di *Laurence Meyer e Chloé Berthélémy (EDRI – European Digital Rights)*./ … Il 10 aprile 2024 l'*Unione Europea voterà una nuova serie di riforme in materia di migrazione. Tra le tante modifiche controverse proposte nel *Nuovo Patto sulla Migrazione e l'Asilo*, una in particolare sembra essere passata inosservata: la riforma, apparentemente innocua, dell'*EURODAC*, la banca dati dell'UE per gestire i flussi migratori. Diverse associazioni e rappresentanti della società civile hanno motivo di temere che le modifiche proposte per l'*EURODAC (European Asylum Dactyloscopy Database)* possano contribuire significativamente all'aumento della violenza contro coloro che si spostano ai confini. La riforma dell'EURODAC, la cui istituzione risale a vent'anni fa, *trasformerà il database in una vera e propria arma tecnologica,* espressione delle politiche migratorie già ostili dell'UE. L'EURODAC sfrutterà le più immorali tecnologie di sorveglianza esistenti – ossia quelle che consentono la cattura, l'elaborazione e l'analisi dei dati biometrici – per permettere agli Stati Membri di avere il pieno controllo sul corpo e sui movimenti dei migranti. Biometria per il controllo delle persone nere ───────────────────────────────────────────── Con la raccolta dei dati biometrici, per molti il corpo è da tempo diventato un “passaporto” personale. Per “biometria” s'intende il processo di creazione di dati a partire dalle caratteristiche biologiche o fisiologiche di una persona. *Impronte digitali, immagini facciali e scansioni dell'iride* sono tra le tipologie di dati biometrici più utilizzate dai governi per identificare in modo univoco una persona. Storicamente, l'identificazione di ogni singolo individuo è fondamentale per l'organizzazione del controllo statale e del potere sulla popolazione. In particolare, consente alle autorità governative di rintracciare, monitorare e limitare i movimenti delle persone. Non sorprende che la biometria stia diventando *il fulcro dell'espansione dei sistemi di sorveglianza tecnologica degli Stati* e, ancor meno, che stia diventando parte delle politiche di controllo dell'immigrazione. L'origine stessa della sorveglianza biometrica è da ricercare nelle pratiche coloniali di supremazia e discriminazione nei confronti di determinati gruppi di persone. In passato, fu la tratta transatlantica degli schiavi a fornire l'occasione per sviluppare tecnologie per marcare, identificare e rintracciare i prigionieri africani come proprietà su scala globale. I metodi di identificazione forense, che comprendevano la descrizione dettagliata delle caratteristiche facciali e corporee, le impronte digitali e le fotografie dei sospetti criminali, venivano applicati principalmente nelle colonie dell'Impero francese per garantire l'ordine e la continuità del regime coloniale. Allo stesso modo, *i colòni britannici fecero partire il primo programma di identità biometrica su larga scala*, che raccoglieva le impronte digitali dei residenti dell'India conquistata. Ecco quindi come la registrazione biometrica in quanto sostituto dei documenti d'identità è diventata presto realtà per i corpi delle persone nere, specialmente per coloro che transitano al confine. Le politiche dell'Unione Europea non sono che la continuazione di questa Storia draconiana. Basti pensare che la prima banca dati biometrica centralizzata dell'UE, l'EURODAC appunto, è stata creata per controllare i movimenti secondari dei richiedenti asilo all'interno dell'UE e per monitorare le persone che attraversano irregolarmente le frontiere esterne. Con la riforma in corso, l'identificazione di massa e sistematica dei richiedenti asilo, dei rifugiati e dei migranti mediante il trattamento dei dati biometrici diventerà la pietra angolare del disumano sistema di asilo dell'UE. La riforma dell'EURODAC peggiorerà i danni delle politiche migratorie (già violente) dell'UE ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── *Nonostante la riforma proposta sia stata presentata come *un «mero tecnicismo»*, il cambiamento in atto ha una connotazione in realtà fortemente politica: infatti, codificherà all'interno della tecnologia *il trattamento violento riservato ai migranti nell'UE*. Ciò faciliterà enormemente fenomeni quali criminalizzazione sistematica, detenzione in condizioni simili a quelle del carcere ed espulsione rapida. Una delle modifiche che potenzialmente ampliano il campo di applicazione dell'EURODAC consiste nel catturare le immagini del volto delle persone (oltre alle impronte digitali). Secondo i politici responsabili, la raccolta di ulteriori dati biometrici sarebbe giustificata dal fatto che alcuni richiedenti asilo, in passato, hanno volontariamente bruciato o danneggiato le dita per alterare le impronte digitali ed evitare l'identificazione. Per coloro che transitano ai confini, *l'identificazione comporta il rischio imminente di essere trattenuti,* rispediti in un altro Stato dell'UE che magari hanno appena lasciato – in genere a causa delle pessime condizioni di accoglienza e delle scarse possibilità di integrazione – o di essere trasferiti nei cosiddetti «Paesi terzi sicuri», dove rischiano persecuzioni e torture. Se le persone sono costrette a farsi del male per evitare l'identificazione, non è forse il caso di riconsiderare le politiche migratorie, rendendole più umane? Non per l'UE, che ha deciso di continuare a sorvegliare e a terrorizzare i migranti. L'EURODAC si sta inoltre trasformando in uno strumento di sorveglianza di massa, prendendo di mira un numero sempre maggiore di persone, compresi i bambini di 6 anni. I deboli tentativi di esigere che la raccolta dei dati avvenga in modo «child-friendly» non sono stati sufficienti a cambiare l'esito della riforma. I bambini saranno sottoposti a una procedura gravemente invasiva e ingiustificata, che di fatto li stigmatizzerà. Si consideri che nell'UE, i minori di 16 anni non sono nemmeno in grado di acconsentire liberamente al trattamento dei loro dati personali ai sensi del regolamento generale sulla protezione dei dati (GDPR). Tuttavia, ai bambini migranti verranno scansionati i volti e rilevate le impronte digitali nei campi di frontiera e nei centri di detenzione. Inoltre, le autorità di polizia potranno accedere ai dati dell'EURODAC senza dover rispondere a (quasi) nessuna condizione, trattando tutti i migranti con presunzione di illegalità. La riforma dell'EURODAC esemplifica i “due pesi e due misure” dell'UE ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── L'uso della sorveglianza biometrica nell'EURODAC ha un solo scopo: *aumentare il potere e il controllo sui migranti*, resi socialmente vulnerabili da politiche e pratiche migratorie immorali. Si tratta di un impiego della tecnologia invasivo, sproporzionato alle reali esigenze dei governi e in pieno contrasto con gli elevati standard europei per la protezione dei dati personali. L'UE sta esplicitamente *elaborando un regime di eccezione nell'ambito del proprio quadro giuridico*, secondo il quale ai migranti spetterebbe un trattamento differenziato rispetto ai cittadini europei. La riforma dell'EURODAC è sintomo di una tendenza europea in rapida diffusione, quella della criminalizzazione e della logica della “polizia”. L'UE unisce erroneamente i concetti di gestione dei flussi migratori e lotta alla criminalità considerando le persone in cerca di aiuto come minacce alla sicurezza di stato. Questo sguardo incriminante porta a presupposti discriminatori, che hanno come conseguenza l'iper sorveglianza e l'individuazione di migranti e minoranze etniche come obiettivo. Con l'enorme diffusione delle banche dati centralizzate, di cui l'EURODAC è un esempio lampante, *l'UE non può più nascondere le sue politiche da “due pesi e due misure”*. --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- Qualunque persona pensi sia impossibile che un giorno possa essa stessa far parte di un "gruppo indesiderato di persone X" per il solo fatto di essere "dalla parte giusta"... non sta pensando abbastanza: «the answer is blowin' in the wind» («No More Auction Block For Me.» [3]) Per approfondimenti in merito alla biometria identificativa, si veda: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biometrics In particolare mi preme sottolineare che l'identificazione (autenticata) biometrica può tranquillamente INCLUDERE le caratteristiche comportamentali: --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- Behavioral characteristics are related to the pattern of behavior of a person, including but not limited to mouse movement,[2] typing rhythm, gait, signature, behavioral profiling, and voice. Some researchers have coined the term behaviometrics to describe the latter class of biometrics. --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- Loving, 380° [1] solo persone nere? o in generale discriminate... e povere?!? [2] spostamenti delle persone discriminate? flussi finanziari dei poveri, anzi degli impoveriti? [3] https://yt.artemislena.eu/watch?v=O0iyrTNKAOU «No More Auction Block For Me (Many Thousand Gone)» see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowin%27_in_the_Wind#Origins_and_initial_res… also see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_market -- 380° (Giovanni Biscuolo public alter ego) «Noi, incompetenti come siamo, non abbiamo alcun titolo per suggerire alcunché» Disinformation flourishes because many people care deeply about injustice but very few check the facts. Ask me about <https://stallmansupport.org>.

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Fwd: invito a Nexa
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 11, 2024

April 11, 2024

L'8 maggio c'è Lieto, che non è spostabile, vero, Dante? Se è così, allora le diciamo 11 settembre, ok? jc -------- Forwarded Message -------- Subject: Re: invito a Nexa Resent-From: juancarlos.demartin(a)polito.it Date: Wed, 10 Apr 2024 22:38:04 +0200 From: Giovanna Sissa <sissa.giovanna(a)gmail.com> To: J.C. DE MARTIN <demartin(a)polito.it> Caro Juan Carlos, purtroppo mercoledì 12 giugno non ce la faccio ad essere a Torino. Parlando di secondi mercoledì del mese, potrei essere a Torino l'8 maggio o l'11 settembre Giovanna Il giorno mer 10 apr 2024 alle ore 17:25 J.C. DE MARTIN <demartin(a)polito.it> ha scritto: Cara Giovanna, non posso ancora confermartelo, ma in linea di principio tu potresti *mercoledì 12 giugno*? L’incontro sarebbe dalle 17 alle 19. jc (messaggio spedito in movimento - scusate brevità ed eventuali refusi) > Il giorno 5 apr 2024, alle ore 18:30, Giovanna Sissa > <sissa.giovanna(a)gmail.com> ha scritto: > > > Caro Juan Carlos, > resto in attesa dunque che mi contattino i tuoi colleghi per un > mercoledì di Nexa. Mi fa molto piacere e ti ringrazio dell’invito. > A presto > Giovanna > > Il giorno ven 5 apr 2024 alle 16:09 J.C. DE MARTIN > <juancarlos.demartin(a)polito.it> ha scritto: > > Cara Giovanna, > > grazie molte per la tua disponibilità per venire al Centro > Nexa a presentare e discutere il tuo nuovo libro, *"Le > emissioni segrete. L'impatto ambientale dell'universo > digitale"*, Il Mulino, marzo 2024 [1]. > > Idealmente ci piacerebbe averti a un "Mercoledì di Nexa", che > si tiene il 2° mercoledì del mese dalle 17 alle 19. I colleghi > che hanno il calendario dei prossimi incontri ti contatteranno > per concordare con te una data che possa funzionare per tutti. > > Intanto ancora grazie e, spero, a prestissimo! > > juan carlos > > [1] > https://www.mulino.it/isbn/9788815388636?forcedLocale=it&fbrefresh=CAN_BE_A… > <https://www.mulino.it/isbn/9788815388636?forcedLocale=it&fbrefresh=CAN_BE_A…> > > > >

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16 aprile 2024 alle ore 16 " Workshop: Compliance integrata: il punto di vista della procura della repubblica e quello dell'impresa"
by Mauro Alovisio April 8, 2024

April 8, 2024

Gent.mi ho il piacere di segnalarvi e invitarvi al workshop: "*Compliance integrata:* *Il punto di vista della procura della repubblica e dell impresa" *il p*rossimo 16 aprile alle ore 16 *presso la sede della Saa, in via Ventimiglia 115 a Torino Sono previste, in apertura, le relazioni del prof. Sergio Foà, dell'avv. Mariagrazia Pellerino, del dott. Ciro Santoriello e della dott.ssa Claudia Gualtierotti del Gruppo Iren: è stato richiesto l'accreditamento per la formazione obbligatoria per gli avvocati. Per informazioni : https://www.saamanagement.it/events/compliance-integrata-imprese-pubbliche-… Durante il workshop sarà presentata la nuova edizione del *master executive on line compliance integrata per le società pubbliche e private.* All'interno del master sono approfondite attraverso testimonianze di professori, manager e consulenti diverse tematiche di interesse; la formazione e conservazione dei documenti informatici, la trasparenza on line, prevenzione della corruzione, whistleblowing, la protezione dati e cybersecurity Al termine del workshop seguirà un aperitivo. Per chi fosse impossibilitato a partecipare in presenza si può seguire on line in streaming Potete confermare la partecipazione entro il 12 aprile attraverso la compilazione del seguente form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdznYCfbq-Mcr2dFhyxpvSnmR2B3_GOnfU… Cordiali saluti Mauro Alovisio

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Exclusive: Google Workers Revolt Over $1.2 Billion Contract With Israel
by Daniela Tafani April 8, 2024

April 8, 2024

Exclusive: Google Workers Revolt Over $1.2 Billion Contract With Israel By Billy Perrigo April 8, 2024 8:00 AM EDT In midtown Manhattan on March 4, Google’s managing director for Israel, Barak Regev, was addressing a conference promoting the Israeli tech industry when a member of the audience stood up in protest. “I am a Google Cloud software engineer, and I refuse to build technology that powers genocide, apartheid, or surveillance,” shouted the protester, wearing an orange t-shirt emblazoned with a white Google logo. “No tech for apartheid!” The Google worker, a 23-year-old software engineer named Eddie Hatfield, was booed by the audience and quickly bundled out of the room, a video of the event shows. After a pause, Regev addressed the act of protest. “One of the privileges of working in a company which represents democratic values is giving space for different opinions,” he told the crowd. Three days later, Google fired Hatfield. Hatfield is part of a growing movement inside Google that is calling on the company to drop Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion contract with Israel, jointly held with Amazon. The protest group, called No Tech for Apartheid, now has around 40 Google employees closely involved in organizing, according to members, who say there are hundreds more workers sympathetic to their goals. TIME spoke to five current and five former Google workers for this story, many of whom described a growing sense of anger at the possibility of Google aiding Israel in its war in Gaza. Two of the former Google workers said they had resigned from Google in the last month in protest against Project Nimbus. These resignations, and Hatfield’s identity, have not previously been reported. No Tech for Apartheid’s protest is as much about what the public doesn’t know about Project Nimbus as what it does. The contract is for Google and Amazon to provide AI and cloud computing services to the Israeli government and military, according to the Israeli finance ministry, which announced the deal in 2021. Nimbus reportedly involves Google establishing a secure instance of Google Cloud on Israeli soil, which would allow the Israeli government to perform large-scale data analysis, AI training, database hosting, and other forms of powerful computing using Google’s technology, with little oversight by the company. Google documents, first reported by the Intercept in 2022, suggest that the Google services on offer to Israel via its Cloud have capabilities such as AI-enabled facial detection, automated image categorization, and object tracking. Further details of the contract are scarce or non-existent, and much of the workers’ frustration lies in what they say is Google’s lack of transparency about what else Project Nimbus entails and the full nature of the company’s relationship with Israel. Neither Google, nor Amazon, nor Israel, has described the specific capabilities on offer to Israel under the contract. In a statement, a Google spokesperson said: “We have been very clear that the Nimbus contract is for workloads running on our commercial platform by Israeli government ministries such as finance, healthcare, transportation, and education. Our work is not directed at highly sensitive or classified military workloads relevant to weapons or intelligence services.” All Google Cloud customers, the spokesperson said, must abide by the company's terms of service and acceptable use policy. That policy forbids the use of Google services to violate the legal rights of others, or engage in “violence that can cause death, serious harm, or injury.” An Amazon spokesperson said the company “is focused on making the benefits of our world-leading cloud technology available to all our customers, wherever they are located," adding it is supporting employees affected by the war and working with humanitarian agencies. The Israeli government did not immediately respond to requests for comment. There is no evidence Google or Amazon’s technology has been used in killings of civilians. The Google workers say they base their protests on three main sources of concern: the Israeli finance ministry’s 2021 explicit statement that Nimbus would be used by the ministry of defense; the nature of the services likely available to the Israeli government within Google’s cloud; and the apparent inability of Google to monitor what Israel might be doing with its technology. Workers worry that Google’s powerful AI and cloud computing tools could be used for surveillance, military targeting, or other forms of weaponization. Under the terms of the contract, Google and Amazon reportedly cannot prevent particular arms of the government, including the Israeli military, from using their services, and cannot cancel the contract due to public pressure. Recent reports in the Israeli press indicate that air-strikes are being carried out with the support of an AI targeting system; it is not known which cloud provider, if any, provides the computing infrastructure likely required for such a system to run. Google workers note that for security reasons, tech companies often have very limited insight, if any, into what occurs on the sovereign cloud servers of their government clients. “We don't have a lot of oversight into what cloud customers are doing, for understandable privacy reasons,” says Jackie Kay, a research engineer at Google’s DeepMind AI lab. “But then what assurance do we have that customers aren't abusing this technology for military purposes?” With new revelations continuing to trickle out about AI’s role in Israel’s bombing campaign in Gaza; the recent killings of foreign aid workers by the Israeli military; and even President Biden now urging Israel to begin an immediate ceasefire, No Tech for Apartheid’s members say their campaign is growing in strength. A previous bout of worker organizing inside Google successfully pressured the company to drop a separate Pentagon contract in 2018. Now, in a wider climate of growing international indignation at the collateral damage of Israel’s war in Gaza, many workers see Google’s firing of Hatfield as an attempt at silencing a growing threat to its business. “I think Google fired me because they saw how much traction this movement within Google is gaining,” says Hatfield, who agreed to speak on the record for the first time for this article. “I think they wanted to cause a kind of chilling effect by firing me, to make an example out of me.” Hatfield says that his act of protest was the culmination of an internal effort, during which he questioned Google leaders about Project Nimbus but felt he was getting nowhere. “I was told by my manager that I can't let these concerns affect my work,” he tells TIME. “Which is kind of ironic, because I see it as part of my work. I'm trying to ensure that the users of my work are safe. How can I work on what I'm being told to do, if I don't think it's safe?” Three days after he disrupted the conference, Hatfield was called into a meeting with his Google manager and an HR representative, he says. He was told he had damaged the company’s public image and would be terminated with immediate effect. “This employee disrupted a coworker who was giving a presentation – interfering with an official company-sponsored event,” the Google spokesperson said in a statement to TIME. “This behavior is not okay, regardless of the issue, and the employee was terminated for violating our policies.” Seeing Google fire Hatfield only confirmed to Vidana Abdel Khalek that she should resign from the company. On March 25, she pressed send on an email to company leaders, including CEO Sundar Pichai, announcing her decision to quit in protest over Project Nimbus. “No one came to Google to work on offensive military technology,” the former trust and safety policy employee wrote in the email, seen by TIME, which noted that over 13,000 children had been killed by Israeli attacks on Gaza since the beginning of the war; that Israel had fired upon Palestinians attempting to reach humanitarian aid shipments; and had fired upon convoys of evacuating refugees. “Through Nimbus, your organization provides cloud AI technology to this government and is thereby contributing to these horrors,” the email said. Workers argue that Google’s relationship with Israel runs afoul of the company’s “AI principles,” which state that the company will not pursue applications of AI that are likely to cause “overall harm,” contribute to “weapons or other technologies” whose purpose is to cause injury, or build technologies “whose purpose contravenes widely accepted principles of international law and human rights.” “If you are providing cloud AI technology to a government which you know is committing a genocide, and which you know is misusing this technology to harm innocent civilians, then you're far from being neutral,” Khalek says. “If anything, you are now complicit.” Two workers for Google DeepMind, the company’s AI division, expressed fears that the lab’s ability to prevent its AI tools being used for military purposes had been eroded, following a restructure last year. When it was acquired by Google in 2014, DeepMind reportedly signed an agreement that said its technology would never be used for military or surveillance purposes. But a series of governance changes ended with DeepMind being bound by the same AI principles that apply to Google at large. Those principles haven’t prevented Google signing lucrative military contracts with the Pentagon and Israel. “While DeepMind may have been unhappy to work on military AI or defense contracts in the past, I do think this isn’t really our decision any more,” said one DeepMind employee who asked not to be named because they were not authorized to speak publicly. “Google DeepMind produces frontier AI models that are deployed via [Google Cloud’s Vertex AI platform] that can then be sold to public-sector and other clients.” One of those clients is Israel. “For me to feel comfortable with contributing to an AI model that is released on [Google] Cloud, I would want there to be some accountability where usage can be revoked if, for example, it is being used for surveillance or military purposes that contravene international norms,” says Kay, the DeepMind employee. “Those principles apply to applications that DeepMind develops, but it’s ambiguous if they apply to Google’s Cloud customers.” A Google spokesperson did not address specific questions about DeepMind for this story. Other Google workers point to what they know about Google Cloud as a source of concern about Project Nimbus. The cloud technology that the company ordinarily offers to its clients includes a tool called AutoML that allows a user to rapidly train a machine learning model using a custom dataset. Three workers interviewed by TIME said that the Israeli government could theoretically use AutoML to build a surveillance or targeting tool. There is no evidence that Israel has used Google Cloud to build such a tool, although the New York Times recently reported that Israeli soldiers were using the freely-available facial recognition feature on Google Photos, along with other non-Google technologies, to identify suspects at checkpoints. “Providing powerful technology to an institution that has demonstrated the desire to abuse and weaponize AI for all parts of war is an unethical decision,” says Gabriel Schubiner, a former researcher at Google. “It’s a betrayal of all the engineers that are putting work into Google Cloud.” A Google spokesperson did not address a question asking whether AutoML was provided to Israel under Project Nimbus. Members of No Tech for Apartheid argue it would be naive to imagine Israel is not using Google’s hardware and software for violent purposes. “If we have no oversight into how this technology is used,” says Rachel Westrick, a Google software engineer, “then the Israeli military will use it for violent means.” “Construction of massive local cloud infrastructure within Israel’s borders, [the Israeli government] said, is basically to keep information within Israel under their strict security,” says Mohammad Khatami, a Google software engineer. “But essentially we know that means we’re giving them free rein to use our technology for whatever they want, and beyond any guidelines that we set.” Current and former Google workers also say that they are fearful of speaking up internally against Project Nimbus or in support of Palestinians, due to what some described as fear of retaliation. “I know hundreds of people that are opposing what’s happening, but there’s this fear of losing their jobs, [or] being retaliated against,” says Khalek, the worker who resigned in protest against Project Nimbus. “People are scared.” Google’s firing of Hatfield, Khalek says, was “direct, clear retaliation… it was a message from Google that we shouldn’t be talking about this.” The Google spokesperson denied that the company's firing of Hatfield was an act of retaliation. Regardless, internal dissent is growing, workers say. “What Eddie did, I think Google wants us to think it was some lone act, which is absolutely not true,” says Westrick, the Google software engineer. “The things that Eddie expressed are shared very widely in the company. People are sick of their labor being used for apartheid.” “We’re not going to stop,” says Zelda Montes, a YouTube software engineer, of No Tech for Apartheid. “I can say definitively that this is not something that is just going to die down. It’s only going to grow stronger.” https://time.com/6964364/exclusive-no-tech-for-apartheid-google-workers-pro…

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Exclusive: Google Workers Revolt Over $1.2 Billion Contract With Israel
by Daniela Tafani April 8, 2024

April 8, 2024

Exclusive: Google Workers Revolt Over $1.2 Billion Contract With Israel By Billy Perrigo April 8, 2024 8:00 AM EDT In midtown Manhattan on March 4, Google’s managing director for Israel, Barak Regev, was addressing a conference promoting the Israeli tech industry when a member of the audience stood up in protest. “I am a Google Cloud software engineer, and I refuse to build technology that powers genocide, apartheid, or surveillance,” shouted the protester, wearing an orange t-shirt emblazoned with a white Google logo. “No tech for apartheid!” The Google worker, a 23-year-old software engineer named Eddie Hatfield, was booed by the audience and quickly bundled out of the room, a video of the event shows. After a pause, Regev addressed the act of protest. “One of the privileges of working in a company which represents democratic values is giving space for different opinions,” he told the crowd. Three days later, Google fired Hatfield. Hatfield is part of a growing movement inside Google that is calling on the company to drop Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion contract with Israel, jointly held with Amazon. The protest group, called No Tech for Apartheid, now has around 40 Google employees closely involved in organizing, according to members, who say there are hundreds more workers sympathetic to their goals. TIME spoke to five current and five former Google workers for this story, many of whom described a growing sense of anger at the possibility of Google aiding Israel in its war in Gaza. Two of the former Google workers said they had resigned from Google in the last month in protest against Project Nimbus. These resignations, and Hatfield’s identity, have not previously been reported. No Tech for Apartheid’s protest is as much about what the public doesn’t know about Project Nimbus as what it does. The contract is for Google and Amazon to provide AI and cloud computing services to the Israeli government and military, according to the Israeli finance ministry, which announced the deal in 2021. Nimbus reportedly involves Google establishing a secure instance of Google Cloud on Israeli soil, which would allow the Israeli government to perform large-scale data analysis, AI training, database hosting, and other forms of powerful computing using Google’s technology, with little oversight by the company. Google documents, first reported by the Intercept in 2022, suggest that the Google services on offer to Israel via its Cloud have capabilities such as AI-enabled facial detection, automated image categorization, and object tracking. Further details of the contract are scarce or non-existent, and much of the workers’ frustration lies in what they say is Google’s lack of transparency about what else Project Nimbus entails and the full nature of the company’s relationship with Israel. Neither Google, nor Amazon, nor Israel, has described the specific capabilities on offer to Israel under the contract. In a statement, a Google spokesperson said: “We have been very clear that the Nimbus contract is for workloads running on our commercial platform by Israeli government ministries such as finance, healthcare, transportation, and education. Our work is not directed at highly sensitive or classified military workloads relevant to weapons or intelligence services.” All Google Cloud customers, the spokesperson said, must abide by the company's terms of service and acceptable use policy. That policy forbids the use of Google services to violate the legal rights of others, or engage in “violence that can cause death, serious harm, or injury.” An Amazon spokesperson said the company “is focused on making the benefits of our world-leading cloud technology available to all our customers, wherever they are located," adding it is supporting employees affected by the war and working with humanitarian agencies. The Israeli government did not immediately respond to requests for comment. There is no evidence Google or Amazon’s technology has been used in killings of civilians. The Google workers say they base their protests on three main sources of concern: the Israeli finance ministry’s 2021 explicit statement that Nimbus would be used by the ministry of defense; the nature of the services likely available to the Israeli government within Google’s cloud; and the apparent inability of Google to monitor what Israel might be doing with its technology. Workers worry that Google’s powerful AI and cloud computing tools could be used for surveillance, military targeting, or other forms of weaponization. Under the terms of the contract, Google and Amazon reportedly cannot prevent particular arms of the government, including the Israeli military, from using their services, and cannot cancel the contract due to public pressure. Recent reports in the Israeli press indicate that air-strikes are being carried out with the support of an AI targeting system; it is not known which cloud provider, if any, provides the computing infrastructure likely required for such a system to run. Google workers note that for security reasons, tech companies often have very limited insight, if any, into what occurs on the sovereign cloud servers of their government clients. “We don't have a lot of oversight into what cloud customers are doing, for understandable privacy reasons,” says Jackie Kay, a research engineer at Google’s DeepMind AI lab. “But then what assurance do we have that customers aren't abusing this technology for military purposes?” With new revelations continuing to trickle out about AI’s role in Israel’s bombing campaign in Gaza; the recent killings of foreign aid workers by the Israeli military; and even President Biden now urging Israel to begin an immediate ceasefire, No Tech for Apartheid’s members say their campaign is growing in strength. A previous bout of worker organizing inside Google successfully pressured the company to drop a separate Pentagon contract in 2018. Now, in a wider climate of growing international indignation at the collateral damage of Israel’s war in Gaza, many workers see Google’s firing of Hatfield as an attempt at silencing a growing threat to its business. “I think Google fired me because they saw how much traction this movement within Google is gaining,” says Hatfield, who agreed to speak on the record for the first time for this article. “I think they wanted to cause a kind of chilling effect by firing me, to make an example out of me.” Hatfield says that his act of protest was the culmination of an internal effort, during which he questioned Google leaders about Project Nimbus but felt he was getting nowhere. “I was told by my manager that I can't let these concerns affect my work,” he tells TIME. “Which is kind of ironic, because I see it as part of my work. I'm trying to ensure that the users of my work are safe. How can I work on what I'm being told to do, if I don't think it's safe?” Three days after he disrupted the conference, Hatfield was called into a meeting with his Google manager and an HR representative, he says. He was told he had damaged the company’s public image and would be terminated with immediate effect. “This employee disrupted a coworker who was giving a presentation – interfering with an official company-sponsored event,” the Google spokesperson said in a statement to TIME. “This behavior is not okay, regardless of the issue, and the employee was terminated for violating our policies.” Seeing Google fire Hatfield only confirmed to Vidana Abdel Khalek that she should resign from the company. On March 25, she pressed send on an email to company leaders, including CEO Sundar Pichai, announcing her decision to quit in protest over Project Nimbus. “No one came to Google to work on offensive military technology,” the former trust and safety policy employee wrote in the email, seen by TIME, which noted that over 13,000 children had been killed by Israeli attacks on Gaza since the beginning of the war; that Israel had fired upon Palestinians attempting to reach humanitarian aid shipments; and had fired upon convoys of evacuating refugees. “Through Nimbus, your organization provides cloud AI technology to this government and is thereby contributing to these horrors,” the email said. Workers argue that Google’s relationship with Israel runs afoul of the company’s “AI principles,” which state that the company will not pursue applications of AI that are likely to cause “overall harm,” contribute to “weapons or other technologies” whose purpose is to cause injury, or build technologies “whose purpose contravenes widely accepted principles of international law and human rights.” “If you are providing cloud AI technology to a government which you know is committing a genocide, and which you know is misusing this technology to harm innocent civilians, then you're far from being neutral,” Khalek says. “If anything, you are now complicit.” Two workers for Google DeepMind, the company’s AI division, expressed fears that the lab’s ability to prevent its AI tools being used for military purposes had been eroded, following a restructure last year. When it was acquired by Google in 2014, DeepMind reportedly signed an agreement that said its technology would never be used for military or surveillance purposes. But a series of governance changes ended with DeepMind being bound by the same AI principles that apply to Google at large. Those principles haven’t prevented Google signing lucrative military contracts with the Pentagon and Israel. “While DeepMind may have been unhappy to work on military AI or defense contracts in the past, I do think this isn’t really our decision any more,” said one DeepMind employee who asked not to be named because they were not authorized to speak publicly. “Google DeepMind produces frontier AI models that are deployed via [Google Cloud’s Vertex AI platform] that can then be sold to public-sector and other clients.” One of those clients is Israel. “For me to feel comfortable with contributing to an AI model that is released on [Google] Cloud, I would want there to be some accountability where usage can be revoked if, for example, it is being used for surveillance or military purposes that contravene international norms,” says Kay, the DeepMind employee. “Those principles apply to applications that DeepMind develops, but it’s ambiguous if they apply to Google’s Cloud customers.” A Google spokesperson did not address specific questions about DeepMind for this story. Other Google workers point to what they know about Google Cloud as a source of concern about Project Nimbus. The cloud technology that the company ordinarily offers to its clients includes a tool called AutoML that allows a user to rapidly train a machine learning model using a custom dataset. Three workers interviewed by TIME said that the Israeli government could theoretically use AutoML to build a surveillance or targeting tool. There is no evidence that Israel has used Google Cloud to build such a tool, although the New York Times recently reported that Israeli soldiers were using the freely-available facial recognition feature on Google Photos, along with other non-Google technologies, to identify suspects at checkpoints. “Providing powerful technology to an institution that has demonstrated the desire to abuse and weaponize AI for all parts of war is an unethical decision,” says Gabriel Schubiner, a former researcher at Google. “It’s a betrayal of all the engineers that are putting work into Google Cloud.” A Google spokesperson did not address a question asking whether AutoML was provided to Israel under Project Nimbus. Members of No Tech for Apartheid argue it would be naive to imagine Israel is not using Google’s hardware and software for violent purposes. “If we have no oversight into how this technology is used,” says Rachel Westrick, a Google software engineer, “then the Israeli military will use it for violent means.” “Construction of massive local cloud infrastructure within Israel’s borders, [the Israeli government] said, is basically to keep information within Israel under their strict security,” says Mohammad Khatami, a Google software engineer. “But essentially we know that means we’re giving them free rein to use our technology for whatever they want, and beyond any guidelines that we set.” Current and former Google workers also say that they are fearful of speaking up internally against Project Nimbus or in support of Palestinians, due to what some described as fear of retaliation. “I know hundreds of people that are opposing what’s happening, but there’s this fear of losing their jobs, [or] being retaliated against,” says Khalek, the worker who resigned in protest against Project Nimbus. “People are scared.” Google’s firing of Hatfield, Khalek says, was “direct, clear retaliation… it was a message from Google that we shouldn’t be talking about this.” The Google spokesperson denied that the company's firing of Hatfield was an act of retaliation. Regardless, internal dissent is growing, workers say. “What Eddie did, I think Google wants us to think it was some lone act, which is absolutely not true,” says Westrick, the Google software engineer. “The things that Eddie expressed are shared very widely in the company. People are sick of their labor being used for apartheid.” “We’re not going to stop,” says Zelda Montes, a YouTube software engineer, of No Tech for Apartheid. “I can say definitively that this is not something that is just going to die down. It’s only going to grow stronger.” https://time.com/6964364/exclusive-no-tech-for-apartheid-google-workers-pro…

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