According to the U.S. cable news network (CNN), the British Guardian and other media reports, after the Israeli Defense Army was bombed by the use of Microsoft cloud services of the U.S., the Palestinians were massively monitored, Microsoft responded on Thursday local time, the preliminary investigation showed that the relevant reports are true, at present the company has "stopped and disabled a set of cloud and artificial intelligence services used by the next department of the Israeli Defense Ministry".
The response from Microsoft President and Vice President Brad Smith, published on Microsoft's blog, The Guardian said it was the first known case of U.S. technology companies withdrawing services to the Israeli military since a new war broke out.
In the statement, Smith said that Microsoft "does not provide technology for mass surveillance of civilians" and that "while our review is still ongoing, we have found evidence to support what the Guardian reported".
“Therefore, we have informed the Israeli Defense Ministry that Microsoft has decided to suspend and disable certain subscriptions and services of the Israeli Defense Ministry, which involves stopping their use of specific cloud storage and AI services and technologies,” Smith said, adding that the move will not affect Microsoft’s cybersecurity services to Israel and other Middle East countries.
Regarding Microsoft’s move, CNN said an Israeli security official said “the Israeli Defense Forces’ operational capabilities were not damaged.”
According to a survey conducted in early August by the British Guardian and Israeli media magazine +972, the Israeli 8200 intelligence force relied on Microsoft Azure services to store millions of recorded Palestinian calls in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.