Israel used Microsoft’s Dutch data centre for mass surveillance

Microsoft’s vice-president Brad Smith has admitted that the Israeli army used the company’s huge data centre in Middenmeer, north of Amsterdam for the mass surveillance of Palestinians.

Microsoft has now “ceased and disabled a set of services to a unit within the Israel ministry of defence” he said in a blog post on the company website.

Microsoft said in August it would review the situation following a report in the Guardian newspaper about an IDF unit using its Azure system for storing data files of phone calls obtained through mass surveillance of civilians in Gaza and the West Bank.

The paper said files suggested that by July this year, 11,500 terabytes of Israeli military data – equivalent to approximately 200m hours of audio – was held in Microsoft’s Azure servers in the Netherlands, while a smaller proportion was stored in Ireland.

During the review, Smith said, “we found evidence that supports elements of the Guardian’s reporting”. This evidence, he said, “includes information relating to IMOD consumption of Azure storage capacity in the Netherlands and the use of AI services.”

The Israelis have now been told that Microsoft is halting its access to specified services, “including their use of specific cloud storage and AI services and technologies”, he said.

The overall review is still ongoing.