Microsoft is using illegal bribes in the Middle East and Africa

https://www.lioness.co/post/microsoft-is-using-illegal-bribes-in-the-middle-east-and-africa-why-is-the-sec-turning-a-blind-eye

by hosteur • 3 years ago

236 182 3 years ago

lioness.co

nikanj• 3 years ago

Not to defend Microsoft, but isn’t everyone?

midasuni• 3 years ago

No. And corrects it’s very difficult to avoid it. And often more expensive. And sometimes you have to simply not do business instead of paying the bribe.

justsomehnguy4• 3 years ago

$COMPANYNAME is using illegal bribes in the Middle East and Africa

/thread.

A former colleague based in Saudi Arabia who had become upset by what he saw taking place at Microsoft began forwarding me emails and documentation—and I learned that the corruption went much deeper than I had suspected.

Great, the guy just confessed receiving the internal documents from a company sent by an accomplice.

This decision maker on the customer side would send an email to Microsoft requesting a discount, which would be granted, but the end customer would pay the full fee anyway. The amount of the discount would then be distributed among the parties in cahoots: the Microsoft employee(s) involved in the scheme, the partner, and the decision maker at the purchasing entity—often a government official.

Yep, the most straightforward and easy way to get some additional money.

In a 2015 meeting with members of the Nigerian Parliament, the president of the Senate complained to me that the government had paid $5.5 million for Microsoft licenses for hardware they did not possess. This should never have happened, because Microsoft’s standard practice was to meet with the National Assembly’s IT department and financial controller to check the number of computers needing licenses before submitting any proposal.

This is not MS' problem, it's the problem of some corrupt paper-pusher who managed to convince all parties what there was a need to spend $5.5M.

Likewise, auditors discovered that Qatar’s Ministry of Education was paying $9.5 million annually over seven years for Microsoft Office and Windows licenses they weren’t using—as they didn’t even have any PCs or laptop computers

Again, this is not MS' problem.

To sum up: the guy lived in the bubble for 20 years and suddenly he understood.

chillydawg• 3 years ago

I hope never to come across you in real life or do business with you. Your response to reported illegal activity is to laugh at the reporter? Do better.

justsomehnguy4• 3 years ago

Sorry to burst your bubble, but this is how the things are done in the real life.

is to laugh at the reporter

Sorry, but while I didn't laugh at the reporter I can't believe someone worked for 15 years in ME/A and didn't notice the corruption and bribes.

do business with you

Thanks, I dont' want to do business with someone who didn't understand the comment yet responds with "Do better".

And because you need a clarification: no, I don't defend the corruption described in TFA, I just merely point out what the problem lies not in MS itself but in the modus operandi of many, many people with access to government funds.

NinjaKitten• 3 years ago

^^ This guy bribes.

vetinari• 3 years ago

Not necessarily, might be just an observer.

You would be shocked, but it is very similar in EU countries too.

shapefrog4• 3 years ago

be distributed among the parties in cahoots: the Microsoft employee(s) involved in the scheme, the partner, and the decision maker at the purchasing entity

Fraud.

In the government had paid $5.5 million for Microsoft licenses for hardware they did not possess

Microsoft being paid for something doesnt sound like Microsoft bribing someone.

Qatar’s Ministry of Education was paying $9.5 million annually over seven years for Microsoft Office

Microsoft being paid for something doesnt sound like Microsoft bribing someone.

I too have a Microsoft 365 subscription that keeps autorenewing that I never use.

justsomehnguy4• 3 years ago

Fraud.

If the money passed through a 3rd-party which took the cut then it's not even a fraud, because it's up to the purchasing entity to use [or not] the discount. Like sure, it's an obvious collusion but from the point of law there is nothing wrong here.

I too have a Microsoft 365 subscription that keeps autorenewing that I never use.

And this is the gist of most of OP woes.

walrus015• 3 years ago

If you think this is shocking, wait until you dig into the history of US and UK weapons sales (and ongoing highly paid contractor support) to the Saudi military and "police" forces.

Software licensing bribery and kickbacks are peanuts and crumbs on the floor by comparison.

A great deal of it is justified under the concept that because they're definitely not on good terms with the mullahs in Qom, anyone opposed to the Iranian ayatollahs as a regional power must be our friend, right?

LudwigNagasena2• 3 years ago

If you think this is shocking, wait until you dig into the history of the EU countries selling arms and anti-protest gear to Russia despite the embargo that was put in place in 2014.

walrus015• 3 years ago

Can you provide some specifics?

GuardianCaveman• 3 years ago

I worked on a program for a foreign military sale to a Middle East country and learned a lot like every foreign company had to pay someone to get ahead at all. It’s crazy to me this is news. It’s literally impossible to do business there without bribes. The USAF didn’t knoww and we had to work hard to hide the money used for that purpose. We lost part of a lucrative contract because of a rival defense company bribing a different prince.

shapefrog4• 3 years ago

the history

You dont need to go beyond yesterday for history. The foreign aid budget for example is litteral bribery with a less icky name.

seydor• 3 years ago

As opposed to legal bribes?

elashri• 3 years ago

Usually these countries doesn't have lobby groups in the same sense. That's why it is illegal bribes.

dataflow• 3 years ago

I think they mean the (sub)set of foreign bribes that are illegal for US entities.

rob742• 3 years ago

All bribes are illegal for US entities. If they were legal, they would call it something else...

cabirum• 3 years ago

"grease payments"

janmarsal• 3 years ago

Yes, they use legal bribes in the US and Europe.

npteljes2• 3 years ago

And illegal ones too. For one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_licensing_corruption...

gryn• 3 years ago

Alright playing the devil's advocate. even though I'm against both forms obviously.

yes, "legal bribes" go by many names depending on the target, amount and place.

tips, lobbying, political donations, promises, non-political donations/gifts to a "friend", funding, an implicit promise to land a comfy job after gov, etc ...

the difference between the west and other places is that in the west when you try to screw over other people, you design legal frameworks and loopholes that make said bribes legal and rightful and other shenanigans that diffuse the trail while places like the middle east and elsewhere it's more straight forward and has less abstraction layers, they look you in the eye smile and let you know that their screwing you.

the western model is better because you don't have to deal with the emotional reaction that comes from the humiliation and injustice face to face, and if you're not observing enough you might not even notice it if you want.

you can take a lot bribes and translate them into more acceptable/familiar language:

- bribing a waiter to not mess with your food: customer service tip.

- bribing a local government worker to give you a document that's rightfully your and skip your a lot of BS round-trips across many desks: an express lane service a la TSA preCheck/ Airlines Priority queues that helps people vote with their wallet about the urgency of the getting that document.

- having a bribe someone to land some big contract: an auction mechanism where bidders display the seriousness of their commitment to the project with their wallets.

- bribing a government official to not enforce a rule or interpret it in specific ways or create new regulation that just happen to be in your favor: lobbying

the list can go on.

qikInNdOutReply4• 3 years ago

Yes, they do. They all do. You need a rule of law, to tame corruption and no non-democracy has that.

The attempt to deploy western culture globally has failed miserably, generating jobs who exist merley to errect a veneer of compliance.

Behind the thin layer of paint, the old culture and world continus happily on unphased by the hysterics. And it was always painfully obvious for those in the know.

For example there was a law in many arab countries, that you could not do buisness with israel and do buisness with them. Yet, when you opened company location maps, there they were, side by side, right next to the company "morals & mission statements" tab. The obvious answer, bribes in broad daylight.

Now, as the western exported "cultural revolution" winds down in obvious failure, all that veneer fades away and the ugly old world reappears as if it was never gone.

Very soon, the workers with confiscated passports might as well be called slaves again. Its a sad, depressing state of affairs, but then it was for the non deluded befor this point in time too.

fryry3• 3 years ago

On the last point, I must be missing something obvious, but why don't those workers who have their passports taken report them lost/stolen and get a new one from their embassy?

walrus015• 3 years ago

Because their job is tied to company owned by the citizen of the host country who employs them (their visa sponsor), and they're probably sending money back home to India, Pakistan or Bangladesh to support a family of eight people. You report that and cause a legal fuss with your employers, you not only don't get paid your previous month of work, you get deported and banned from the UAE or Qatar or Saudi Arabia for life.

walrus015• 3 years ago

Behind the thin layer of paint, the old culture and world continus happily on unphased by the hysterics

For instance:

I've always thought it was really funny when westerners adopted the belief that Benazir Bhutto was some enlightened champion of democracy and progress while remaining blissfully ignorant of the historical position of vast wealth and power her family occupies in Sindh.

bilqis2• 3 years ago

Inside “democratic” countries, they are just bribing via legal means - see lobbying.

qikInNdOutReply4• 3 years ago

Yes. Sadly yes. But its not spread societywide. You do not bribe your way out of law enforcement etc. You do not have that society wide tax on just "breathing" - yet. There is also not yet, the worst kind of corruption, were incompetence in education gets through and enshrined to entrench other corrupt incompetence and finally destroys the mechanism to dislodge incompetence.

Were a visit to the doctor might kill you, because they all got their diploma because they know the same family and never spent a day awake and sober in university. And the health minister is from that family. And the whole anti-corruption self-repair mechanism is dysfunct, cause its married to that familys cousin.

usrusr2• 3 years ago

There are certainly many bad things happening this way, but it's a far cry from the undeniably clear transaction structures of "those in control of formalities will block everything forever unless the inofficial tax is paid as well"

refurb2• 3 years ago

So when EFF raises funds to petition elected officials to protect privacy that’s bribery?

Because thats what lobbying is.

mrweasel5• 3 years ago

Many years ago (15+ years ago), I worked for a company that wanted to sell some software product to China. Now, you can't legally use bribes where I am, "the EU says NO". What you can do is hire a Chinese consulting company, they will invoice you a surprisringly high amount for their services and take some of that money and use it to grease the wheels of the Chinese bureaucracy. At least at that point in time, it was basically required to win any sort of contract on that level in China.

Microsoft using bribes in Africa, the Middle East or parts of Asia isn't a Microsoft problem, it a problem that those specific countries need to deal with. Microsoft would most likely have made their sales anyway, if bribes hadn't been a thing, it would just be slightly cheaper to do so, so I don't think management at Microsoft cares one way or the other.

qikInNdOutReply4• 3 years ago

Company "fasttracked" worker visas to china, are basically olympic sport visas etc. reassigned for a bribe.

ngcazz• 3 years ago

It's absolutely a Microsoft problem that they don't take a moral stand on bribing.

SiempreViernes6• 3 years ago

No, this isn't Microsoft simply "paying the cost of business", this is Microsoft tolerating its own employees stealing millions for themselves on the excuse that their other corrupt practices brings in business.

vlovich123• 3 years ago

Every year I’m forced to watch training videos saying that it’s against US laws to be involved in bribery abroad. As I understand it, there’s severe federal penalties for briberies committed abroad. It may not be a Microsoft problem exclusively, but I can’t imagine “hey everyone else is breaking the law” is going to work as a defense.

jrockway• 3 years ago

I had to take some training at work on not doing exactly that. I guess the regulators are on to the little scam.

Nullabillity• 3 years ago

So hold the company liable for its subcontractors' violations. This isn't rocket surgery.

op00to4• 3 years ago

Now, you can't legally use bribes where I am, "the EU says NO". What you can do is hire a Chinese consulting company, they will invoice you a surprisringly high amount for their services and take some of that money and use it to grease the wheels of the Chinese bureaucracy.

Just so y'all know, people have been convicted for international bribery in the US using "arms-length" consultants. This has been called out in every ethics training I've had to take since like 2004.

pcthrowaway3• 3 years ago

All this recent talk of "banning AI work for the sake of the economy" (perhaps when they're fully competitive with human-equivalent workers across all multidisciplinary domains) has had me thinking the money will just go to international consulting firms or independent contractors that can then use the AI tools as they wish.

That's why people need to start thinking of these issues globally, not in terms of what "their country" can do

rrrrrrrrrrrryan• 3 years ago

use it to grease the wheels of the Chinese bureaucracy.

"Facilitating payments" aka "grease payments" are explicitly allowed in the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

This article is about actual, real bribery, which is illegal under the FCPA.

wodenokoto• 3 years ago

The article isn’t so much about Microsoft paying bribes to grease the wheels as it is about Microsoft employees skimming money from the contract.

pulse74• 3 years ago

Yes, they do. But not everyone does it! Better not to do business at all than to be part of bribing!

npteljes2• 3 years ago

After growing to a certain size, you just don't not do business. Because if you don't to some businesses, your competitors will, and then they'll outgrow you and force you out of the market.

I'm not siding with Microsoft here or any other business, just stating that this is how things are. I mean, of course, there could be many other ways, but this carries the least risk for the business.

ratg13• 3 years ago

Honestly, most of them do it.. not even because they want to, but because it's expected on the other end.

I've been in contract negotiations where the purchase of industrial equipment is contingent upon prostitutes and trips to DisneyWorld.

Of course we don't want to pay for these things, but if you don't, they just give the contract to someone who will.

Guthur• 3 years ago

As opposed to the legal bribery in democracy, it turns into an oligarchy, it always does. This is known to be true in the past and observable truth in the present.

lynx237• 3 years ago

Sorry, but democracy is not automaticcally a guarantee that there is no corruption. I can tell, because I am living in a supposedly democratic country which has gained quite a number of points in the corruption-index recently...

qikInNdOutReply4• 3 years ago

There is the ability of the population to organize and vote out and and all corrupt influence. Usually the citzenry is kept down via media and culture, but as several revolutions have shown, the old culture can get thrown out hard and fast, if the population has enough.

layer85• 3 years ago

You’re undermining your point by calling it “supposedly”. You’re otherwise not wrong, though.

eru12• 3 years ago

The comment you replied to said the opposite. They said:

You need a rule of law, to tame corruption and no non-democracy has that.

As far as I can tell, that implies the only combination that's impossible is non-democracy and non-corruption. Ie all non-democracies are corrupt, but some democracies might also be corrupt.

Btw, I don't think that's even true: British ruled Hong Kong had rule of law, but no democracy.

However statistically, there seems to be at least a weak correlation (negative) between corruption and democracy.

laratiede• 3 years ago

The older I get the harder it is to not see Pareto was right about democracy.

"Pareto believed that societies are ruled by an elite class, which he called the "circulation of elites." In his view, these elites are able to gain and maintain power by using their wealth, intelligence, and social connections to influence political and economic institutions. Pareto saw democracy as a way to redistribute power and wealth from the elite to the masses, but he was skeptical that this could ever be achieved in practice. He argued that even in democracies, power tends to be concentrated in the hands of a small group of people who are able to control the political process and manipulate public opinion."

I am not sure what the argument really is against that. That sounds like the reality we live in.

aww_dang3• 3 years ago

Doesn't democracy simply institutionalize corruption?

Where is the incentive for honesty or long term thinking for politicians or political candidates?

The politician's primary concern is to win the next election. Promises of any sort can be fielded to win this battle. Ideally his promises should motivate voters to support his campaign. After the election, excuses can be made. The opposition offers an easy scapegoat for not delivering upon previous promises.

While in office, the politician has every incentive to milk his position for all it is worth. He doesn't personally have a stake in the country's budget. The politician is driven to drive funds towards his donors. His only time preference is to make it happen before his term expires. Long term results of policies or contracts are besides the point.

After spending considerable time in 3rd world countries, my takeaway is that corruption in the developed world is simply more expensive. Yes, you can legally lobby for your company to receive gov. contracts. The difference is that you need to pay expensive lawyers to execute the process. You can't just simply throw a few hundred dollars around or ask your brother-in-law.

There's a right way to lobby in the west and a wrong way, which is tabooed as corruption. The end result is much the same. The difference is often partisan perception.

eru12• 3 years ago

You need a rule of law, to tame corruption and no non-democracy has that.

Old British-ruled Hong Kong arguably had rule of law and no democracy.

xbmcuser• 3 years ago

Western Countries promote and protect corruption in the rest of the world. Where does the corruption money go? Where do the corrupt people and their families live after they are removed from power for whatever reason?

eynsham• 3 years ago

HK (pre~2020) had and Singapore has rule of law.

Laaas• 3 years ago

Yes, they do. They all do. You need a rule of law, to tame corruption and no non-democracy has that.

Contrary to common belief, corruption does not have much to do with democracy. There are many non-democratic countries without corruption, and many democratic countries with corruption (and the inverse too for both).

The relation is that, currently, a high standard of living leads both to less corruption and to more democracy.

sourcecodeplz• 3 years ago

illegal bribes

Are there also legal bribes?

oxfordmale3• 3 years ago

Yes, legal bribes are how most of the Anglo-Saxon world works. For example, if I want certain favours from the current UK government, I can give a friend of mine an interest-free loan for him to donate significant sums of money to the current ruling party (Tories). You get away with this as long as there is no written record and just a discussion on the golf club. Not surprisingly, the government may then award you lucrative contracts or change the law in subtle ways that are in your favour.

Of course, the friend in question will then get endorsed for a lucrative position, a cushy consultancy job or a non-executive board membership.

smcl• 3 years ago

I think that would still be illegal but just very hard to prove and prosecute.

rob742• 3 years ago

Those aren't legal either, unless you go by the motto "you are only guilty if you get caught"...

shapefrog4• 3 years ago

I want certain favours from the current UK government, I can give a friend of mine an interest-free loan for him to donate significant sums of money to the current ruling party (Tories). You get away with this as long as there is no written record

Having seen this in action (UK, Tory government) ... you are taking too many steps and too much complication. You donate publicly, on the register, to the party, candidates, (leadership candidates) etc. They give you things you ask for. The entire "scheme" is far more transparent than you think. It is also much cheaper than you think.

The expensive path is to literally hire a sitting member of parliament to your company and then you also get things you ask for.

The system works(/worked) extremely well because the people involved had some class and would only ask and take within reason. If you know, you know.

postingawayonhn• 3 years ago

You get away with this as long as there is no written record and just a discussion on the golf club.

That's not legal then. There's just a lack of evidence to bring a successful prosecution.

nixass• 3 years ago

illegal bribes
> Are there also legal bribes?

Yes, lobbying. Legal bribery.

shmerl• 3 years ago

Citizens United case legalized bribes in the form of political campaign contributions.

tialaramex• 3 years ago

A less facetious answer: Yes.

Anti-bribery laws authorise the use of bribes under narrow circumstances:

Particularly if the bribe seems to be necessary for safety of life (e.g. although you can clearly see the hospital has empty beds and equipment, the nursing staff assure you that your employee can't be helped and must just die here in the waiting room, sure enough once they have been bribed suitably the employee is given a bed and treatment begins). The bribe must be properly reported, both as a business expense and specifically as a bribe paid.

It is also certainly true that countries with global anti-bribery laws (including the US and UK) definitely don't actually enforce those laws when it comes to arms sales or other government authorised activity that frequently involves corrupt foreign governments. But that's just an ordinary example of "Do as I say, not as I do".

Dalewyn2• 3 years ago

Unlike the other responses, I will provide a more mundane example that's hopefully more relatable: Giving your mailman or deliveryman a can of coke/pepsi as a token of appreciation.

Next time, they're going to be more careful and timely handling your package, and you'll keep asking if they want a drink. It's unfair, because you will get special treatment compared to those who don't, but we're all human and everyone's happier. This is legal bribery.

seymore_12• 3 years ago

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54922374 from the article "As of 1996, about half of the countries in the OECD allowed companies to deduct bribes paid to foreign officials from their taxes, including Germany, France, Australia, New Zealand and Switzerland. They argued that such practices were routine business expenses in some countries."

one more: https://www.reuters.com/article/swiss-bribes-idUSL8N2HX5BV

it_citizen• 3 years ago

I wonder if the department of justice is going to launch the same enthusiastic corruption investigations they used to massively fine foreign competitors of American companies. \s

pjmlp• 3 years ago

I bet everyone had a stellar score on the code of condut and company values trainings.

Hence why they are worthless beyond getting a checkmark on the yearly corporate trainings.

aww_dang3• 3 years ago

Illegal overseas bribes are distinct from Microsoft's domestic legal lobbying activities.

When I worked as a bicycle courier in DC I recall picking up from Microsoft, 1401 I st. NW. No software was developed at this office. It was just highly paid lawyers and lobbyists. Consider how productive that is in real terms, and remember those costs are passed onto you as a consumer.

The delivery was 9 Titleist golf balls in a box, each ball inside of an individual box. There was also a greeting card. The entire delivery was packaged inside of a bubble wrapped envelope. The congressperson wasn't interested in sending an aide outside to collect the package even after the contents were explained.

The check inside of the greeting card for 10,000 USD was not enticing enough for them to come outside.

In these scenarios, packages were sent to the "security trailer", which was no longer a trailer, but a concrete block structure nearby on Capitol Hill.

Inside of the trailer, I was instructed to individually double bag each golf ball, with a barcode on the inner bag. A security person or Capitol Hill policeman pedantically ordered each step of the process from a drive-thru quality intercom system.

For his safety, he stayed behind the bulletproof glass with a positive air pressure differential. He still had to sign my manifest to accept the delivery. It was like standing in front of a laboratory flow hood as I passed my clipboard into the robotic drawer.

After bagging, I was instructed to individually x-ray each item. Next, the entire package was double bagged again with yet another barcode. Finally, I handed off the package through the airlock. About 15 minutes total. Could have been longer, but he already had my data entered into the computer system. I was a regular visitor.

The entire procedure is absurd. The distinction of illegal bribes in the title speaks to this. Say what you will about the necessity of the state, but whether legal or illegally practiced, government gatekeepers are a net drain on the economy. If you cannot appreciate the productivity losses in abstract terms, consider how inefficient the processes are to simply deliver a check for ten-thousand dollars to a congressperson.

crooked-v3• 3 years ago

I don't really understand what connection the security around packages has to do with the whole lobbying thing. It's hardly surprising they'd have some elaborate procedures around that when random people try to deliver pipe bombs or anthrax spores to Congresspeople every few years.

aww_dang3• 3 years ago

One of the funny points was that you could bring any kind of package with you into the House and Senate office buildings as long as it was not a destined for those buildings. As an example, the same package (addressed to some other building) could have come in with me, if I were there to pickup an outgoing package.

There's an special kind of absurdity when delivering the legal bribe itself is inefficient and the security theater is nonsensical.

uwagar• 3 years ago

bribes are illegal. what is an illegal bribe? and what is this word using? say it like it is. microsoft is bribing.

davidguetta• 3 years ago

Lobbying is legal bribing

yakubin7• 3 years ago

Honest question: what’s the difference between a bribe and a legal fee? E.g. when you apply for a UK visa, you need to pay over 1k GBP as an “application fee”. Why is this application fee not considered a bribe?

Ekaros2• 3 years ago

Bribe goes to person doing the work. Fee goes to organization and the worker likely sees none of it.

UK can ask high fees for various reason, maybe to cover costs, or just for political reasons to get less people applying for visa.

iso16312• 3 years ago

What's the difference between a bribe and a tip

yakubin7• 3 years ago

In that case I prefer bribes. I prefer paying people rather than bureaucracies.

SiempreViernes6• 3 years ago

When you buy groceries from the store, do you also consider that bribing the clerk? Of not, can you explain what you see as the difference?

yakubin7• 3 years ago

The difference is I pay for what I get. With the visa application fee, there’s nothing that can be worth £1k there. Note that I didn’t include fees for healthcare and taxes in that figure. It’s just a nonsense fee on top for nothing.

PeterisP• 3 years ago

The difference is that bribery is about the "agent-principal" distinction. If an agent who is supposed to represent the interests of the principal actually does so (e.g. follows the policy when making decisions and the money flows as intended by the principal) that's normal behavior; but if they take money to breach their duty of trust, that's a bribe.

Since the agent receiving money for UK visa works for the UK, them doing what UK requires is not a bribe - perhaps you might argue that it's extortion or something else, but not a bribe, because there is no breach of duty.

StevigeHoning• 3 years ago

Can one do business in the Middle East & Africa without bribing?

freetanga• 3 years ago

In other news, water is wet.

justsomehnguy4• 3 years ago

OMG

The article provides two internals audit reports, which are PDFs with blacked out names:

Exceed IT Services [0]
Diyar United Company [1]

Yes, this is just the black bars on top the info.

Not only author explicitly confirmed receiving teh internal MS documents but he didn't do a proper cleanup of the documents he provides to whole world.

This guy, along with his accomplice in MS, is in deep, deep trouble if anyone bothers to come for them.

[0] https://58a44b37-ba55-451b-989d-b8bc5339d45f.usrfiles.com/ug...

[1] https://58a44b37-ba55-451b-989d-b8bc5339d45f.usrfiles.com/ug...

layer85• 3 years ago

You can also read the “end customer names” and “reseller names” (or rather, copy and paste them).

lhnz• 3 years ago

This is actually particularly bad. They followed company policy and pointed out the compliance issues but Microsoft did not reprimand the employee involved and instead promoted them into a position that they could more easily evade accountability and also punish the person that had drawn attention to compliance issues.

It gets worse as they are put on a performance improvement plan (PIP), even though they have 18 years of experience and presumably had no significant performance issues up until this point.

If the information about corruption within the post is true, Microsoft undoubtedly deserve to pay a significant fine, but unfortunately:

  > What is a shock: This time around, the SEC and DOJ
  > have both declined to investigate Microsoft over 
  > the same types of bribes in the Middle East and 
  > Africa. They acknowledged my evidence (which I 
  > submitted three times) yet did not take up the 
  > case, claiming that the current pandemic has 
  > prevented them from gathering more evidence from 
  > abroad—even though I have already provided 
  > documentation that I believe shows Microsoft is in 
  > breach of the 2019 agreement and is still 
  > participating in corrupt business practices in 
  > direct violation of U.S. law.

I think that by not punishing this the SEC and DOJ are sending a signal to whistleblowers in large corporations that they do not take compliance seriously and that they will not protect employees that try to draw attention to wrongdoing. At the very least it suggests to me that when whistleblowing, you must avoid alerting anybody in your organisation that you disagree with what you see, and do everything through external parties instead of internal policies.

Ligma123• 3 years ago

Only europeans people with no contact with non-europeans believe the rest of the world works the same way as we do.

If you want to do anything in those regions, bribes should be part of your budget, all the way down.

Even the workers that need to travel to those places should have a budget for those bribes, as in some places even the police will try to get you in trouble if you don't give them money, or in some African countries, even food is accepted.

popcalc2• 3 years ago

europeans people with no contact with non-europeans

I think you mean 5-10 countries in Western, Northern Europe right? Most of Europe is rife with corruption on every level and always has been.

layer85• 3 years ago

How do you explain that the author apparently had no trouble closing large contracts without bribing?

cutemonster2• 3 years ago

Seems there was lots of bribery going on all the time, he just didn't know about it, didn't take part in it himself:

many employees younger than me, in lower positions, were driving luxury cars and purchasing homes

and it took until this event, for him to start connecting the dots:

the partner in the deal [...] had been terminated four months earlier for poor performance on the sales team, and corporate policy prohibits former employees from working as partners

mkoubaa2• 3 years ago

Even if your point is granted it does not account for Microsoft employees stealing from Microsoft.

jimmySixDOF• 3 years ago

I knew a guy who had some business to do with a Government office in an African country. Specifically he was trying to get GIS data for a certain region. He met with the local branch of the concerned department and got nowhere for a while with the excuse that all their systems were old and slow and he didn't have the right signatures anyway. He looked around the office, agreed the computers were all super old, offered to replace them all, and after that suddenly the remaining signatures were not important anymore. He supplied about ten PCs and he got the data he was looking for.

spyder• 3 years ago

In the case of Microsoft, Europe is not that different:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_licensing_corruption...

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/hungary-subsidiary-microsoft-...

mkoubaa2• 3 years ago

Microsoft's mission to empower people anywhere in the world to do more apparently means transferring wealth to thugs in developing countries without actually delivering technology.

petro74• 3 years ago

I live in Africa. Nairobi, Kenya to be precise.

One obvious problem I have seen is the procurement laws and procedures. Especially in government and public companies. For example, you need to go through a tender process to procure basic stuff like licenses for software. So a separate company (not Microsoft) submits a tender to "supply" another company for licenses to use Microsoft products.

This opens up a clear avenue for corruption. And it is heavily exploited. These companies basically submit tenders for the these licenses at exorbitantly inflated prices while doing absolutely nothing. There is nothing preventing these public companies and government agencies for purchasing directly from Microsoft except for the procurement rules and procedures.

So we end up in a situation where folks that are awarded these tenders end up pocketing large amounts for "supplying Microsoft software". Local Microsoft employees are obviously colluding with them.

Reviewing these procurement rules and laws may have some impact in reducing these obvious form of corruption.

dagorenouf• 3 years ago

just to be clear, can a bribe ever be legal?

Eddy_Viscosity2• 3 years ago

Bribery seems to be a thing that happens everywhere, cough..clarence thomas..cough...

Microsoft is using illegal bribes in the Middle East and Africa

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