Microsoft signs a groundbreaking agreement with UN Human Rights Office

Microsoft today announced that they have signed a 5-year agreement with UN Human Rights Office as part of which Microsoft will offer a grant of $5 million (USD) to support the work of the UN Human Rights Office. Microsoft will help UN Human Rights Office to develop advanced technology to better predict, analyze and respond to critical human rights situations.

“As a global company that sees the problems of the world, we believe that we have a responsibility to help solve them,” said Microsoft President Brad Smith. “We have an untapped opportunity to use the power of technology to collect data, analyze that data and equip the United Nations to advance human rights around the world.”

Microsoft is also planning to develop Rights View, an information “dashboard” that will allow UN human rights staff to aggregate large quantities of internal and external data on specific countries and types of rights violations in real time. This dashboard view will help facilitate analysis, ensure early warning of emerging critical issues and provide data to guide responses.

In addition to using technology, Microsoft will also work with the UN Human Rights Office to raise awareness of the role that private companies across the world should play in driving respect for human rights and to promote more responsible business conduct.

“This could be a truly groundbreaking agreement,” said UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein. “We live in a rapidly evolving age, where technology can either be used to solve human rights problems or misused to erode human rights. Similarly, companies can infringe people’s rights, or they can be a major progressive force.”

Learn more about this partnership here.