By R "Ray" Wang

News Analysis: Big Tech's Role In Supporting Ukraine rwang0 Fri, 03/04/2022 - 06:50

Massive Dilemma In Taking Action

As famously put by Peter Parker in Spiderman, "With great power comes great responsibility". The digital giants are walking a thin-gauged tight rope. On one hand, they feel compelled to assist Ukraine. On the other hand, they face potential loss of future business, retaliation in fines, arrests, or service shut downs by the Russian government. In fact, Russia has passed laws to put western tech companies under their jurisdiction.

However, not taking action or holding a position of neutrality could be seen as not standing up for western values. Digital giants and big tech companies that take no action could face a barrage of cancel culture actions from customers, shareholders, and partners. This show of support and compliance with an authoritative government would negatively impact their brand.

In general, the tech companies have not faced US sanctions to take action. As private companies, they have independently chosen to stand up to Putin with hopes that they will not shut down access to services in Ukraine and Russia.

Actions Taken To Date Balance Restricting Propaganda While Keeping Services Open

Social networks are being used by dissidents to organize and push back against Putin's forces. Given Ukraine's tech work force, the ties to western countries are strong and come from their decades of product engineering expertise, outsourced engineering capabilities, and strong engineering and math talent. In general, tech companies are aiding Ukraine by blocking Russian state-run media sites such as Sputnik and RT. Furthermore, tech companies are monitoring for cyber attacks. Consequently, Russia sees these tech giants as actors in conflict by restricting sales, ads, and information flow. Here's what the digital giants have done to date (see Figure 1):

Figure 1. Big Tech Actions In Russian-Ukraine War


Organization	Ceased Sales	Blocked State Owned Media	Halted Services	Addressing Misinformation	Activated Services	Provided Free Services
AirBnB					Free housing
Apple	Products and services	Taking Sputnik and RT off App Store	Turned off traffic conditions in mapping
Google		Blocking YouTube channels for RT and Sputnik	Turned off traffic conditions in mapping	Monitoring deep fakes		Protecting 100 Ukranian Websites with cyber security
Meta		Restricting RT and Sputnik in EMEA		Monitoring deep fakes
MIcrosoft		Limiting downloads of state run media services		Deranking RT and Sputnik search results
Netflix	Not adding 20 government supported content sites
Snap	Halting ad sales in Russia and Belarus		Stopped advertising in Ukraine and Russia
SpaceX					Starlink offerred to Ukraine
Twitter		Tagging RT and Sputnik		Moinitoring russian interference
AT&T						Free phone calls from US to Ukraine
Verizon						Free phone calls from US to Ukraine

AirBnB - offered free housing to Ukrainians fleeing
Apple – ceased sales of products in Russia, Apple Pay limited. Traffic and live incidents on Apple Maps halted. RT and Sputnik apps taken off the AppStore
Facebook – tagged Russian Governments, restricting Russia’s RT and Sputnik In Europe
Google – blocked YouTube channels and RT and Sputnik, disabled traffic conditions on Maps, taking action against hacking and influence operations providing protection to 100 Ukrainian websites. Services still available in Russia.
Microsoft – limited downloads of Russian state media services focusing on hacking threats, deranking RT and Sputnik on search results.
Netflix – not adding 20 government controlled stations to streaming service yet.
Snap – stopped all advertising in Russia Ukraine and Belarus. Halting ad sales in Russia and Belarus
Space X - activated Star Link for Ukrainians
Twitter – banned RT and Sputni ads, monitoring for deep fakes
US Phone carriers - waived fees to customers who are calling Ukraine

Binance and Coinbase have taken a neutral stance of not unilaterally freezing funds as those actions would be contrary to the decentralization movement and blockchain principles. Meanwhile, institutions such as MIT have servered ties with a Russian Research university.

The Bottom Line: Powerful Tech Companies Have Chosen Sides

The balance between keeping services open and restricting misinformation places the big tech companies in the cross hairs of the Putin regime. These public companies have taken a side with their western governments instead of remaining neutral. In this case, the actions align well with democratic values and the support of a country under attack. However, the actions of these companies and organizations should remind the general public the awesome power of big tech and how this concentration of power can be abused without proper checks and balances.

Your POV

What actions do you think big tech companies should take with Ukraine? Do you worry about the huge concentration of power in a few hands? How do you see the scenario playing out?

Add your comments to the blog or reach me via email: R (at) ConstellationR (dot) com or R (at) SoftwareInsider (dot) org. Please let us know if you need help with your strategy efforts. Here’s how we can assist: