<story><title>Microsoft turned down facial-recognition sales on human rights concerns</title><url>https://www.reuters.com/article/us-microsoft-ai/microsoft-turned-down-facial-recognition-sales-on-human-rights-concerns-idUSKCN1RS2FV</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ergothus</author><text>I&amp;#x27;ve been harsh to Microsoft in the past (for what I consider good reasons) but I want to give credit where credit is due - this is exactly the sort of behavior that many have been asking for from companies.  Foresee a problem, don&amp;#x27;t do the thing.&lt;p&gt;It doesn&amp;#x27;t matter that there&amp;#x27;s an argument of this refusal being good business - truth is, big companies being confident that consumer outrage won&amp;#x27;t translate into enough market impact to say they shouldn&amp;#x27;t do the bad thing has become the norm.  Nice to see an instance where that&amp;#x27;s the not the case.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>amrrs</author><text>In the other news, Microsoft accused of being &amp;#x27;complicit&amp;#x27; in persecution of 1 million Muslims after helping China develop sinister AI capabilities.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.businessinsider.com&amp;#x2F;microsoft-china-muslim-crackdown-ai-partnership-complicit-2019-4&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.businessinsider.com&amp;#x2F;microsoft-china-muslim-crackd...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Microsoft turned down facial-recognition sales on human rights concerns</title><url>https://www.reuters.com/article/us-microsoft-ai/microsoft-turned-down-facial-recognition-sales-on-human-rights-concerns-idUSKCN1RS2FV</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ergothus</author><text>I&amp;#x27;ve been harsh to Microsoft in the past (for what I consider good reasons) but I want to give credit where credit is due - this is exactly the sort of behavior that many have been asking for from companies.  Foresee a problem, don&amp;#x27;t do the thing.&lt;p&gt;It doesn&amp;#x27;t matter that there&amp;#x27;s an argument of this refusal being good business - truth is, big companies being confident that consumer outrage won&amp;#x27;t translate into enough market impact to say they shouldn&amp;#x27;t do the bad thing has become the norm.  Nice to see an instance where that&amp;#x27;s the not the case.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ddebernardy</author><text>Isn&amp;#x27;t the actual problem lawsuit related?&lt;p&gt;If I am not mistaking, the shareholders are entitled to sue under the current doctrine for not acting in their best interest.&lt;p&gt;MS would arguably defend itself making the case that key employees might resign, or key accounts might leave, or whatever else its legal team comes up with. MS might even win such a case for all we know.&lt;p&gt;Still, a court case could be an unwanted distraction. Or an interesting test case, depending on viewpoint.</text></comment>