During a recent Build conference presentation, Neta Haiby, Microsoft’s security chief for AI, inadvertently disclosed sensitive information regarding Walmart’s utilization of Microsoft’s AI services. This occurred amidst a disruption caused by protesting individuals.
Although the livestream was muted and the camera was directed away shortly after the protest began, the session continued shortly thereafter following the removal of the demonstrators. However, Haiby accidentally navigated to Microsoft Teams during her screen sharing, exposing internal communications about Walmart’s planned integration of Microsoft’s Entra and AI gateway services.
Haiby was co-presenting a Build session focused on AI security best practices alongside Sarah Bird, who leads Microsoft’s responsible AI initiatives. The session was interrupted by two former Microsoft employees protesting against the company’s cloud contracts with the Israeli government.
Hossam Nasr, an organizer with the protest group No Azure for Apartheid and a dismissed Microsoft employee, criticized Bird, shouting, “How dare you speak about responsible AI while Microsoft is contributing to the genocide in Palestine?”
As one of Microsoft’s primary corporate clients, Walmart currently employs the company’s Azure OpenAI service for various AI applications. In messages from the Teams chat, a Microsoft cloud solutions architect stated, “Walmart is ready to rock and roll with Entra Web and AI Gateway.” Additionally, a Walmart AI engineer expressed that “Microsoft is WAY ahead of Google with AI security. We are excited to go down this path with you.”
Microsoft was asked for a statement regarding the protest and the Teams leak, but no response was received by the time of publication.
The two protestors, including Nasr and Vaniya Agrawal, have a recent history of disrupting Microsoft events. Agrawal also interrupted key figures such as Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates during last month’s 50th anniversary celebrations. An email obtained by Technology News indicates she left her position at Microsoft shortly after submitting her two weeks’ notice.
This incident marks the third time protesters have interrupted the Microsoft Build conference, following a disruption earlier in the week involving a Palestinian tech worker and another protest during the keynote address by CEO Satya Nadella.
In the days leading up to this protest, Microsoft announced that it had performed an internal review in coordination with an unnamed external firm to evaluate the use of its technology in the ongoing conflict in Gaza. The company described its relationship with Israel’s Ministry of Defense (IMOD) as a “standard commercial relationship,” claiming it found no evidence that its technologies have been implicated in human rights violations or have violated any of its terms of service.
