Posted by Samantha DoerrPublic Affairs Manager, Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit
There are few online crimes more heartbreaking than technology-facilitated crimes against children, which is why Microsoft is working with experts to advance innovation to combat them, including a research effort on child sex trafficking being introduced today by danah boyd and Rane Johnson of Microsoft Research and the Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit. Through Microsoft’s previous work, we have found that research and creative collaborative efforts can have a meaningful impact on crime, and we believe the same can be true in the commercial sexual exploitation of children.
Microsoft Research has released today an outline of fifteen different aspects of the child sex trafficking process fueled by U.S. demand where technology might play a role. We welcome readers to review this framework and provide feedback as we drive for scientifically sound research to understand and disrupt the problem.
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Posted by Brendon LynchChief Privacy Officer, Microsoft
Privacy is a top priority for many users of cloud computing, so Microsoft today is releasing a white paper that details many of the specific data protection policies, procedures and tools that have been integrated into Office 365, our newest cloud productivity service.
I recently returned from a two-week trip to discuss a range of privacy topics with customers and regulators in Australia and New Zealand. In virtually every conversation, I was asked about Microsoft’s approach to data protection in our cloud services. Microsoft representatives around the world report hearing similar questions regularly in each of their regions.
Posted by Peter CullenGeneral Manager, Trustworthy Computing, Microsoft
Today, European Union Commissioner Neelie Kroes announced the formation of the ‘CEO Coalition on Child Online Safety.’ Microsoft is pleased to be a founding member of this coalition, which is a collective effort of government and industry to discuss best practices that “make the Internet a better place for children.”
I will serve as Microsoft’s representative on the CEO Coalition, and Microsoft remains committed to advancing ways to make online services and the Internet safer for children. We also believe such joint efforts, involving all major industry players in the digital ecosystem – including hardware manufacturers, technology companies, content creators, telecommunications and online service providers – are necessary to achieve real progress in the area of online safety.
Posted by Karen JonesVice President & Deputy General Counsel, HR Legal, Microsoft
Our country’s economic strength relies in significant part on the contributions of the best and the brightest talent from around the world. At Microsoft, we see this every day through the great work of our foreign national employees, who contribute to our growth and success by driving technological innovation and development in all of our product and service offerings. As we’ve said before, in a world where, increasingly, jobs follow talent, high-skilled immigration can create more American jobs, and our immigration laws must be reformed to allow American companies to attract and retain the global talent we need to help rebuild our economy.
While we wait for Congress to address some of the key structural issues with our immigration system—such as ongoing green card backlogs—there are administrative reforms and procedural approaches that can substantially improve the experience of foreign nationals making high-value contributions to our economy.
Yesterday, Microsoft hosted an employer roundtable discussion with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Alejandro Mayorkas to address these types of improvements.
Posted by Rob BernardChief Environmental Strategist, Microsoft
As I recently blogged, Microsoft has a delegation participating in the 17th United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, otherwise known as COP17. With those negotiations ongoing, we thought it was a good time to pull together the perspectives we’ve shared over the past several years on climate change policy.
Three years ago, we adopted a broad policy statement on climate change, which reflects clear support for government policy to address climate change. We sometimes get questions about the positions various business groups we belong to have taken on climate change, and we’ve publicly clarified how a few of those groups’ positions differ from our own, here and here. As referenced in this blog post, I have met multiple times with top Climate Officials to talk about ways the Information, Communications and Technology sector (ICT) can drive significant reductions in society-wide annual carbon emissions.