Alphabet

2024 Shareholder Resolutions on Generative AI & Disinformation: A Build-the-Vote Messaging Guide for Sustainable Investors

2024 Shareholder Resolutions on  Generative AI & Disinformation: A Build-the-Vote Messaging Guide for Sustainable Investors

The rise of generative AI (gAI) over the last 18 months has raised numerous questions about how to regulate these powerful new technologies so that they do not compromise people’s ability to exercise their human rights. Generative AI poses a particular threat to the right to freedom of expression, including the right to access information, because it makes it so easy to create and spread deceptive, yet believable content. False content threatens people’s ability to make informed decisions, a prerequisite for healthy democracies.

Ahead of This Year’s Elections, Shareholders Demand Transparency from Big Tech on Risks of AI-Powered Disinformation

Ahead of This Year’s Elections, Shareholders Demand Transparency from Big Tech on Risks of AI-Powered Disinformation

Shareholders at Alphabet and Meta, following on the success of a similar resolution at Microsoft last month, have filed shareholder proposals recommending that the companies issue annual reports on the risks of misinformation and disinformation produced and amplified by their deployment of generative artificial intelligence (gAI). All three companies have made multibillion dollar investments in gAI.

Big Tech Shareholder Proposals: Annual Meeting Results Offer Lessons for the Future

Big Tech Shareholder Proposals:  Annual Meeting Results Offer Lessons for the Future

The big tech companies have tremendous positive potential, and tremendous capacity to harm. Over the past several years, investors have turned up the pressure on tech, shattering shareholder proposal records and making the case for responsible and rights-respecting corporate governance. Open MIC has been, and continues to be, an important part of that effort.

Majority of Alphabet Independent Shareholders Vote To Support A Racial Equity Audit

Majority of Alphabet Independent Shareholders Vote To Support A Racial Equity Audit

According to final voting numbers for Alphabet’s 2022 annual general meeting, approximately 64.3 percent of independent shareholders voted in favor of a third-party racial equity audit analyzing the company’s impacts on Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) communities. However the proposal failed to earn an overall majority due to the outsized voting power of Alphabet founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page.

Alphabet Insider Shareholders: Support the Shareholder Proposal for a Racial Equity Audit

Alphabet Insider Shareholders: Support the Shareholder Proposal for a Racial Equity Audit

Sergey Brin, Larry Page, and Eric Schmidt: As Class B shareholders, your support or abstention has the power to make or break this popular and necessary investor-led advocacy. We urge you to uphold Alphabet’s principles and “do the right thing” by supporting proposal 9 for an independent racial equity audit.

Alphabet Shareholders File Proposal for Racial Equity Audit, Activists and Employees Endorse

Alphabet Shareholders File Proposal for Racial Equity Audit, Activists and Employees Endorse

Earlier this week, the Nathan Cummings Foundation filed a shareholder proposal asking Alphabet, the parent company of Google and YouTube, to commission an independent racial equity audit “analyzing Alphabet Inc.’s adverse impacts on Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) communities.”

Shareholders Want Google to Protect — Not Punish — Employees Who Voice Human Rights Concerns

Shareholders Want Google to Protect — Not Punish — Employees Who Voice Human Rights Concerns

Leading up to the June 3 annual meeting of Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company, investors have filed a shareholder proposal asking the company’s Board of Directors to evaluate its whistleblower protection policy, and to improve company practices to ensure the protection of employees who raise concerns about human rights abuses and other threats to the public interest.

Shareholders Tell Google and Facebook: Confronting Your Civil Rights Failures Includes Fixing Your Boards

Shareholders Tell Google and Facebook: Confronting Your Civil Rights Failures Includes Fixing Your Boards

Citing a host of concerns about social media platforms and their global impact on civil and human rights, shareholders have filed proposals at Alphabet (Google’s parent company), Facebook and Twitter asking the companies to establish Director-level oversight and expertise on those issues. Shareholders are concerned by big tech’s ongoing negligence around enabling racism and discrimination online and threatening the human rights of consumers worldwide.