early 200 workers inside Google DeepMind, the company’s AI division, signed a letter calling on the tech giant to drop its contracts with military organizations earlier this year, according to a copy of the document reviewed by TIME and five people with knowledge of the matter. The letter circulated amid growing concerns inside the AI lab that its technology is being sold to militaries engaged in warfare, in what the workers say is a violation of Google’s own AI rules.
The DeepMind letter, dated May 16 of this year, begins by stating that workers are “concerned by recent reports of Google’s contracts with military organizations.” It does not refer to any specific militaries by name—saying “we emphasize that this letter is not about the geopolitics of any particular conflict.