The “Moral Rating Agency” (MRA) isn’t impressed with companies driving through loopholes to profit on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

…Microsoft Corp… on the Moral Rating Agency’s ‘Hall of Shame’ of companies still allegedly involved in Russia, ranked according to the Agency’s “moral rating.”

Marketwatch says MRA was set up specifically to examine integrity of companies pledging to exit Russia, using a moral algorithm.

Its latest research argues Microsoft has dropped significantly from a 2022 “faint-hearted chicken” rating, now among the worst companies supporting Russian aggression.

In March, shortly after Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, Microsoft announced the suspension of all new sales of products and services. In June the software giant said it is significantly scaling down its operations in Russia, but would fulfill its existing contractual obligations to customers in the country, according to Reuters.

To recap, Microsoft announced in September 2022 it was working with Russian officials to meet their requirements.

And soon after that Russian media thanked Microsoft for providing new software and support.

The Register perhaps reported it best:

…at the end of 2022 and that as of this week, updates for at least Windows 11 could be downloaded and installed by folks in Russia. “As we shared previously, we have stopped all new product and services sales in Russia and are complying with sanctions from the EU, UK and US,” Microsoft told The Register in a statement. So, updates… are OK, then? Got it.

No new software sales. Only new software. That’s a curious loophole.

Fulfilling contractual obligations sounds like what IBM said when it signed contracts to run death camps for Hitler.

IBM’s Watson was instrumental to the Nazi Holocaust as he and his direct assistants worked with Adolf Hitler to help ensure genocide ran on IBM equipment.

IBM was so obsessive about these genocide contracts that it demanded the U.S. government ensure machines be retrieved from Germany and returned with full payment (from seized German funds) for services delivered to Hitler.

This shouldn’t be news to anyone, yet the fact that IBM could still name anything Watson is proof that it’s still news to everyone.

IBM maintained a customer site, known as the Hollerith Department, in virtually every concentration camp to sort or process punch cards and track prisoners. The codes show IBM’s numerical designation for various camps. Auschwitz was 001, Buchenwald was 002; Dachau was 003, and so on. Various prisoner types were reduced to IBM numbers, with 3 signifying homosexual, 9 for anti-social, and 12 for Gypsy. The IBM number 8 designated a Jew. Inmate death was also reduced to an IBM digit: 3 represented death by natural causes, 4 by execution, 5 by suicide, and code 6 designated “special treatment” in gas chambers. IBM engineers had to create Hollerith codes to differentiate between a Jew who had been worked to death and one who had been gassed, then print the cards, configure the machines, train the staff, and continuously maintain the fragile systems every two weeks on site in the concentration camps.

Are the “Gates” of hell what we should call Microsoft’s contractual obligations to Russia?

Will we find out later that Microsoft was complicit, for example, in the horrible systemic kidnapping and abuse of Ukrainian children by Russian soldiers? It seems likely, given Microsoft called out providing child-related “services” (e.g. forced assembly and re-education) as acceptable Russian use.

That should be straightforward enough for Microsoft to be investigated and held accountable… unlike IBM, which still uses the “Watson” brand after his exposed role in genocide.

Thomas Watson chose to tabulate the Nazi census, to accept Hitler’s medal, and to fight for control of Dehomag. And he made other equally indefensible choices in his years of doing a profitable business counting Jews for Hitler…

IBM’s decisions and role are indefensible.

Morality may be more complicated for Microsoft, in ways the MRA calculator above didn’t consider. Let’s suppose a software company today supplies backdoors and remote control into updates entering Russian territory.

After all, Russia itself demanded Microsoft treat the country uniquely. Request granted?

In that sense, every Russian system taking updates from Microsoft now may be totally compromised by American military intelligence. And at the same time Russian systems not taking updates from Microsoft also may be… compromised.

We’re taking about Microsoft, after all. And war. And everyone in Russia surely knows the danger of “using” Windows.

It’s complicated.

My money is on Microsoft aiding America with what it wants, by giving Russia what it doesn’t understand.

That algorithm seems beyond the MRA, obviously, but the real proof would be Microsoft pushing code that (even indirectly) stops Russia torturing abducted children, let alone prevents Russia’s wider war crimes and its constant bombing of civilians.

Yes, Tesla is breaking bad, like it’s 2021 again.

The cars keep destroying themselves, leaving everyone scratching their heads.

“It looks like it was trying to board a ferry and suddenly accelerated into the gate, basically destroying the Tesla,” said McLean. “We don’t know what caused it to happen,” said McLean, adding police are initially looking at either a mechanical issue, or a matter concerning the driver, which may have caused the sudden acceleration.

There’s a twist to the story.

There was no vessel in the berth at the time of the incident. The vehicle was not attempting to board a ferry.” […] Typically, in order for a vehicle to get to the ferry ramps it would have to have been authorized to board a ferry, so it remains unclear if the vehicle was intending to board at another ramp but ended up accelerating toward one that had no ferry.

It brings to mind the crash video from China that shows brake lights illuminated, while Tesla insisted the brakes were never used.

Tesla also claims that the driver never pressed the brakes. Pictures from public cameras show that this is not true: the brake lights are clearly on at least one occasion without any obstacles ahead…

It’s a very old problem and Tesla routinely accuses its customers of stepping on the “wrong” pedal continuously and at 100%, such as a recent case where a family drove into a pool.

The big problem with Tesla analysis, of course, is that they may simply have no integrity (especially when compared with other brands). The logs are fallible. So when you read a statement like this one, ask yourself whether the log may record what the car thought and NOT what the driver actually instructed.

Data shows that the vehicle was traveling at 6 mph when the accelerator pedal was abruptly increased to 100%. Consistent with the driver’s actions, the vehicle applied torque and accelerated as instructed.

That phrase “consistent with the driver’s actions” seems wrong. Why would someone write it that way? It gives the impression that they started with that assumption and then just looked for some sloppy way to prove it.

What if the pedal system increased to 100% in contradiction to the driver actions.

I’m not speaking hypothetically but from experience. I’ve been able to inject commands using CAN-bus into cars giving them bogus commands, even exploiting race conditions. Sending 100% accelerator signals and having it hit the logs begs whether any real proof exists of a connection to physical pedal.

You’ve heard of phantom braking. Why not phantom breaking… from unintended acceleration?

NHTSA opened a formal investigation in February 2022 regarding phantom braking incidents. The investigation includes 2021-2022 Tesla Model 3 and Model Y vehicles, and by May 2022, the government knew of more than 750 unintended sudden braking incidents.

Allegedly this is why some Tesla owners think they need a camera on the floor recording their foot positions.

A better solution would be the logs going to the owner. And then the owner regularly testing the logs and validating integrity controls.

With the brake pedal lights in the video contradicting Tesla’s overconfident statement that brakes weren’t applied (according to their logs) you see the problem. With the logs being sent always to the owner’s personal data storage and with regular integrity tests, you’d definitely see the problem.

Here’s the confession:

The intent of the video was not to accurately portray what was available for customers …

What video? This video:

The video, which remains archived on Tesla’s website, was released in October 2016 and promoted on Twitter by Chief Executive Elon Musk as evidence that “Tesla drives itself.” […] When Tesla released the video, Musk tweeted, “Tesla drives itself (no human input at all) thru urban streets to highway to streets, then finds a parking spot.”

If the intent was not to accurately portray what was available then why was the CEO on Twitter promoting the video as evidence of what was available?

What parking spot? This parking spot:

Drivers intervened to take control in test runs [the engineer testified in court]. When trying to show the Model X could park itself with no driver, a test car crashed into a fence in Tesla’s parking lot, he said.

Tesla is just fraud.

Without fraud there would be no Tesla.

More to the point of this story, taken from a wrongful death lawsuit, dozens of people still would be alive today if they hadn’t become victims of Tesla fraud.

Here’s the real kicker to this story. The lawsuit shows that a highly skilled Apple engineer, who repeatedly noticed a defect in Tesla software, couldn’t prevent his own death from it.

The new documents offer clear confirmation of this claim. On at least two prior occasions, Huang’s Model X tried to steer into the concrete barrier at exactly the same spot along highway 101. Each time, Huang noticed the mistake and grabbed the wheel, steering it back into the correct lane.

You only have to lose the fight with defective autopilot software once and you’re dead (e.g. Tesla’s pole position).

That’s actually very similar to the lesson from the Boeing 737 MAX disaster, particularly the Ethiopian crash, where pilots fought with a design defect repeatedly before they tragically lost.

Now everyone should be asking why Tesla hasn’t been “grounded” — banned from operating on public roads.