Microsoft gathers evidence of war crimes

RECORDS of Ukrainian hospital bombings automatically recorded by Microsoft will be used at future “Nuremberg trials” of Russian war criminals, the company’s president has said.

The time and date of attacks are being logged by artificial intelligence tools using live satellite images of occupied Ukraine and the evidence will be made available to prosecutors.

Attacks on locations such as Mariupol’s maternity hospital, destroyed by Russian air strikes in early March, can be captured by commercial satellites and analysed to determine who was responsible.

In a speech in London, Microsoft’s president Brad Smith said: “It’s important to ensure that we create the foundation to do what was done after World War Two, at a place like Nuremberg.

“That’s why we’re providing the technology platform free of charge for the prosecutor for the UN and the International Criminal Court.”

A captured Russian soldier has already pleaded guilty to murder and war crimes in a Ukrainian court after murdering a 62-year-old civilian cyclist in eastern Ukraine at the outset of the invasion.

Microsoft has given Ukraine $100m (£80m) of help moving its government IT onto servers outside the country so its public sector can continue to operate.

Mr Smith said cloud computing servers are the modern equivalent of Winston Churchill’s bunker during the Blitz. He also compared Microsoft’s computer antivirus to the RAF’S earlywarning radar systems during the Battle of Britain.