Summary

IBM is a well-known computer company in the world. In the late 1800s, it was first
established by Herman Hollerith as the Computing, Tabulating, and Recording
Company, abbreviated as C-T-R. The provision of tallying devices for the collation and
evaluation of the 1890 United States census was their first significant contract. The
rapid expansion of the corporation led to the renaming of the business as IBM in the
early 1920s. IBM was the most successful company in the world when it came to
manufacturing computer systems for use in both commercial and academic settings.
The Nazis were heavily invested in technology, just like any other efficiency-focused
organization would be. It wasn't enough for them to only order and maintain track of
office equipment; they also had to do it for all of the Jews who were being held in
concentration camps. In order to accomplish this, they utilized equipment made by IBM.

America is not yet involved in the war battle, but when the bombs made by Hitler
starts to hit the capitals of London, Thomas Watson made a critical decision to prioritize
profit rather than being ethical, and it was to tally the data of the Nazi census, using the
power of the Dehomag organization. IBM is vital in Hitler's plan to exterminate the Jews.
They offered a mechanical alternative called a Hollerith, after its creator Herman
Hollerith. Black has found documents proving Holleriths killed captives at Bergen-
Belsen and other extermination camps. With the help of historians and scholars, he
discovered proof that Holleriths planned the lengthy trains of cattle wagons that carried
condemned human cargo to the death chambers. During the years that he spent
running a successful company counting Jews for Hitler, he also made other decisions
that are just as unjustifiable. Author of the IBM and the Holocaust: The Strategic
Alliance between Nazi Germany and America's Most Powerful Corporation, Edwin Black
claims that IBM not only donated technology to Nazi Germany, but also developed a
"close alliance" with the Nazis. The Nazis did not purchase any data processors from
IBM during that time period. Thomas Watson, the marketing genius who constructed
"Big Blue," feared that other firms would steal their technological techniques if they lost
their grip on their devices. As a result, IBM never sold its hardware but instead
exclusively leased it to clients. If a Hollerith's data revealed that a Nazi captive was too
frail for slave labor, a computer operated by IBM will transport him to a crematorium for
a penalty. When a corporation leases rather than sells its equipment, it should have
known where the software was being placed to use since it provides operations and
assists clients build batch processing for each application. There are a lot of human
rights violations recorded during that time but the IBM company turns a blind eye
because they want to protect their profit that are accrued as a result of its flagrant
disregard for international laws.

Resolution:

Over the years, many lawsuits were launched on favor among all Nazi prison
camp victims against IBM. At January 2002, GIRCA sued IBM in Geneva's Court of First
Instance on behalf of five Roma (Gypsy) orphans. The complaint claimed IBM helped
the Nazis slaughter Gypsies during WWII by equipping them with punch card devices
and computer technologies. Suing for $20,000 per complainant, the plaintiffs demanded
"moral restitution." The complaint was filed in Geneva, where IBM had its European
headquarters during WWII. IBM argues that because its German subsidiary was taken
over by Nazis during the war, it cannot be held liable for how its equipment were
utilized. It was dismissed by the Swiss Court of First Instance for lack of general
sovereignty against IBM. In April 2005, the Court of First Instance rejected the
complaint, citing the statute of limitations and the fact that the alleged injury happened
too long ago. In 2006, the Swiss Supreme Court upheld this decision. Holocaust
survivors filed a class-action litigation against IBM after the book of Black came out,
using the US Alien Tort Claims Act. During WWII, IBM was accused of complicity in
criminal acts and human rights abuses. A month after filing, the plaintiffs voluntarily
dropped their US complaint. The litigants alleged they wished to aid the German
Holocaust Fund. There are no writings to which the complainants had positively proceed
their allegations towards IBM which didn't lead to legal action, IBM was off the moral
hook, hence the justice seeks for its timeframe.