Around 300 London-based members of Google’s AI-focused DeepMind team are seeking to unionize with the Communication Workers Union, according to a Financial Times report that cites three people involved with the unionization effort.
These DeepMind employees are reportedly unhappy about Google’s decision to remove a pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance from its website. They’re also concerned about the company’s work with the Israeli military, including a $1.2 billion cloud computing contract that has prompted protests elsewhere at Google.
One source told the FT that team members feel “duped,” and correspondence reportedly shows that at least five DeepMind staff members have quit citing these issues. DeepMind has around 2,000 total staff members in the United Kingdom.
A Google spokesperson told the FT that the company encourages “constructive and open dialogue with all of our employees.”
A small group of around 200 employees of Google and its parent company Alphabet previously announced that they were unionizing, though as a union representing just a tiny slice of the total Google workforce, it lacked the ability to collectively bargain.