Microsoft is the latest company to take action against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine,
Announcing today that it will stop “all new sales of Microsoft products and services” in the country. “Like the rest of the world, we are horrified, outraged and saddened by the images and news coming out of the war in Ukraine and condemn this unjustified, unprovoked and illegal Russian invasion,” Microsoft President and Vice Chairman Brad Smith wrote in a blog post. message. In addition to stopping sales and services, Microsoft “is closely coordinating and working closely with the governments of the United States, the European Union, and the United Kingdom, and we are stopping many aspects of our business in Russia in accordance with the government’s sanctions decision,” Smith said.
On the contrary, Microsoft will continue to support Ukrainian cybersecurity systems against Russian attacks.
“Since the start of the war, we have acted against Russian positioning, destructive or subversive measures against more than 20 Ukrainian government organizations, IT organizations, and the financial sector,” Smith wrote. “We also acted against cyber attacks against several additional civilian targets. We have publicly expressed our concern that these attacks against civilians violate the Geneva Convention.”
Microsoft detailed its cybersecurity efforts in Ukraine in a Feb. 28 blog post,
Saying its Threat Intelligence Center detected a spate of attacks on Ukraine’s digital infrastructure hours before Russia launched a military attack against Ukraine. “These recent and ongoing cyberattacks have been precisely targeted and we have not seen the use of indiscriminate malware technology that has spread throughout the Ukrainian economy and beyond in the 2017 NotPetya attack,” Smith said, referring to a Ransomware attack in 2017 against a wide range of Ukrainian targets believed to have been created in Russia.
“But we remain particularly concerned about recent cyberattacks against Ukrainian civilian digital assets,
Including the financial sector, the agricultural sector, first responders, humanitarian aid, and organizations and businesses in the energy sector. These attacks on civilian objects are of serious concern under the Geneva Convention. and we have shared information with the Ukrainian government about each of them.”
Smith said Microsoft is also sharing “relevant information” with NATO officials in Europe and the US.
Microsoft joins Airbnb, Spotify, Volkswagen, Oracle, Netflix, Nike, Boeing and a host of other big companies that have stopped selling or manufacturing in Russia. Earlier this week, Cyberpunk 2077 developer CD Projekt announced that it was ending all sales in the country in support of Ukraine.
