As part of Microsoft's more enhanced policy changes to stop any minority investments in facial recognition technology, it is pulling out of a minority investment in an Israeli facial recognition startup. The company made the announcement late last week.
Israeli company AnyVision will stop receiving support from Microsoft after it was found that its facial recognition software was being used by the Israeli government for surveillance. According to reports, the startup was surveilling residents in the West Bank.
M12 Ventures, Microsoft's venture capital arm, backed AnyVision as part of the tech giant's financing round of $74 million. Sans Microsoft, a number of investors are still backing the company including Eldridge Industries, Qualcomm Ventures, Robert Bosch GmbH, LightSpeed Venture Partners, and DFJ Growth and OG Technology Partners.
As a minority investor in a startup that offers sensitive technology, Microsoft clarified via its M12 website that it did not offer the AnyVision "the level of oversight or control that Microsoft exercises over the use of its own technology.
The investigation against AnyVision was performed by former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and his team at Covington & Burling. The result confirmed that the company was using its technology to monitor border crossings between Israel and the West Bank. However, it did not "power a mass surveillance program in the West Bank." AnyVision denied any claims made by Holder and his team, as well as any report indicating it had been surveilling Palestinians.
Microsoft publicized its position in facial recognition technologies in 2018 when President Brad Smith called out the U.S. government to make the regulations around the use of technology clearer and safer. By the end of the year, the tech giant's stance on facial recognition technology became more apparent when Smith wrote a statement regarding the company's approach in facial recognition.
"We and other tech companies need to start creating safeguards to address facial recognition technology," Smith wrote. "We believe this technology can serve our customers in important and broad ways, and increasingly we're not just encouraged, but inspired by many of the facial recognition applications our customers are deploying."
However, following criticisms for its involvement with AnyVision, a company whose principles aren't aligned with Microsoft, the software company eventually pulled out its investment.
Microsoft's decision to withdraw its minority investments doesn't only include AnyVision. The company also announced it wouldn't make any other minority investments in companies selling facial-recognition tech in the future.
