The search giant has made it harder and riskier to protest its policies. Workers are still fighting back. Plus: A community takes down a dat
Google is powering this campaign of surveillance, violence, and repression. Cloud is helping to stitch together CBP surveillance systems along the border and nationwide, while also powering Palantir’s ImmigrationOS system that ICE uses to track immigrants. Google generative AI is being used by DHS and CBP for “workforce enablement” and “improving operational efficiency”. The Play Store has blocked the most effective ICE tracking apps for keeping our communities safe. YouTube has been running ICE recruitment and “self-deport” ads. As the workers who provide the foundational labor in building this technology, we are horrified. On January 11, Google Chief Scientist Jeff Dean tweeted, “We all bear a collective responsibility to speak up and not be silent when we see things like the events of the last week.” We agree. In that spirit, we are speaking up today as Googlers. We are vehemently opposed to Google’s partnerships with DHS, CBP, and ICE. We consider it our leadership’s ethical and policy-bound responsibility to disclose all contracts and collaboration with CBP and ICE, and to divest from these partnerships.
For the anti-ICE Google employees and others, the situation has grown all the more urgent. As WIRED reports, ICE is rapidly and dramatically expanding its operations. The DHS has, as WIRED puts it, “carried out a secret campaign to expand ICE’s physical presence across the US.” There are more than 150 leases and office expansions that portend ICE facilities in nearly every state, many of which will be “located near elementary schools, medical offices, places of worship, and other sensitive locations.”
ICE, however, is deeply and increasingly unpopular nearly everywhere, outside the tech companies and in. And Alex is optimistic that this is helping to turn the tide, that more tech workers at Google and beyond will be willing to step up and speak out.
“I believe that the momentum is on our side,” he says. “Many workers see the current moment as critical. They’re ready to act. The public’s opinion has also shifted. There are various external campaigns that demand Google’s divestment from ICE. Google leadership is going to find itself surrounded by pressure from all sides.”
Alex ended our interview with some words for his fellow Googlers and for employees at any other tech company currently partnering with ICE or the DHS:
“You’re not alone. You have support of your fellow workers in your company and across the industry. It’s time we take responsibility for how our products are used for surveillance and violence.”