Microsoft to keep working with military despite ethics concerns

WASHINGTON – Microsoft said Friday it is prepared to provide its technology to the U.S. military, including for a massive cloud computing project, despite ethics concerns among some of its employees and others in Silicon Valley. "All of us who live in this country depend on its strong defense," Microsoft president Brad Smith said in a blog post. The statement came two weeks after Google dropped out of the bidding for the huge Pentagon cloud computing contract that could be worth up to $10 billion. The company said the deal would be inconsistent with its principles, which left Amazon and Microsoft as the two leading contenders. Smith said Microsoft has been a long-standing supplier of technology for the U.S. military, and added that the company was aware of the potential ethical concerns about the use of artificial intelligence in warfare.