
Google siding with Saudi Arabia, refuses to remove government app tracking women - SirLJ
https://www.businessinsider.com/absher-google-refuses-to-remove-saudi-govt-app-that-tracks-women-2019-3
======
pgeorgi
The "gov app tracking women" angle is a PR stunt by international advocacy
groups and it points at the wrong problem.

The app provides various official services, among them a digitized version of
the "yellow sheet" a legal guardian has to fill out for a woman to be able to
leave the country. ([https://www.rt.com/news/women-tracking-saudi-
arabia-359/](https://www.rt.com/news/women-tracking-saudi-arabia-359/) from
2012 describes this particular system, the app apparently integrates it with
more digital services).

The alternative isn't freedom of movement, it's having to get a signature on
paper and potentially personal appearance of the legal guardian, which is
harder to get (this includes: forge) than a button click on a website. As a
remedy for that reduced trust in the system, it sends an SMS - to the very
same device.

There are activists in Saudi Arabia (see for example
[https://twitter.com/monaeltahawy/status/1095360734798721025](https://twitter.com/monaeltahawy/status/1095360734798721025))
who see value in that type of app because the degree of automation it brings
makes it easier to leave the country without supervision (e.g. by stealing the
legal guardian's phone).

~~~
morpheuskafka
I do think that this is worth noting, however, I still think Google should not
be hosting it as it's still facilitating an immoral action (running an
oppressive government that doesn't respect freedom of movement). I guess it's
kind of a deontologist/consequentialist thing.

~~~
apostacy
Saudi Arabia only freed their African slaves in 1962. What if a new king re-
enslaved them? I guess Google would be fine with hosting slave auction apps
then, by this logic.

I am so disgusted with the den of cowards and hypocrites at Google.

Supercilious Google developers _would_ condescend to us with platitudes of
"Black lives matter" while literally hosting an enslavement app. It really
would happen that way.

Google would censor someone who makes fun of feminism with extreme prejudice,
but will not lift a finger for this actual handmaiden app.

They removed the Gab app at the drop of a hat because they claim to be against
white supremacy, but they tacitly endorse the far more dangerous Chinese
ethnostate to round up minorities into actual camps. The Chinese government
forces Uyghurs in some regions to install apks on their android phones, and
Google will NOT interfere, even though it would be easy to blacklist them.
Maybe it would be ineffective, but it would be doing something. I don't want
to hear that cooperating with oppression is somehow for the greater good. This
is not who we are.

There are actual people who are suffering as a direct result of Google's
refusal to take a stand about who uses their platform. They are clearly
willing to remove apps that displease them for arbitrary reasons, so they have
no excuse not to act.

~~~
joshuamorton
I'd encourage you to read this tweet[0] and this article[1]. They provide
perspectives from Saudi women. To do my best to summarize:

Indeed, the app is bad. That it exists or needs to exist is a bad thing. But
given the Saudi government and Saudi law, the opinion of many women in Saudi
Arabia is that scrapping the app would hurt their agency, not help it. They
need male approval to travel either way, and by making it easier to get, the
app, in practice, gives women more agency by lowering the bureaucratic
barriers to travel.

The best way I can put it is that the app here doesn't really particularly
help the oppressors. Like maybe, in a contrived way, you can argue that by
making the oppression lighter weight you're less likely to have a full on
revolution or something. But then, you've still lessened the oppression.
That's not a bad thing.

But if removing the app from the store makes the experience of women in Saudi
Arabia worse, which is exactly what many of those women are saying, then
removing it doesn't do anything. You're just asking to have the Saudi society
regress even further to a position where in practice women had even less
agency.

Is that better?

[0]:
[https://twitter.com/monaeltahawy/status/1095360734798721025](https://twitter.com/monaeltahawy/status/1095360734798721025)
an

[1]: [http://time.com/5532221/absher-saudi-arabia-what-to-
know/](http://time.com/5532221/absher-saudi-arabia-what-to-know/)

~~~
jka
Could you provide more references backing up the 'opinion of many women in
Saudi Arabia ...' part of your comment?

The tweet seems to reference a single anecdote received in a text message, and
the article mentions "... many Absher users within Saudi Arabia have come to
its defense", without mentioning any particular supportive groups (or
providing numbers).

~~~
joshuamorton
Unfortunately it's particularly difficult to hear the voices of an oppressed
group, especially one where the majority of the commentary is going to be in
another language.

So no. You're probably stuck trusting time on this one.

------
diebeforei485
The app is basically a webview around a government website, and the
notification happens by SMS. I'm still struggling to understand why anyone
thinks removing the app will have any effect - it's not like removing an app
from a store would cause SMS messages to stop.

~~~
gumby
Because their App Store is curated (you couldn't, say, have a child
pornography app) and so by permitting this app they are saying it's OK with
them.

~~~
syrrim
They're curating for user experience, not for political opinions. If someone
uploaded a vim clone google isn't taking a stance in the editor war by letting
it stay up.

"Saying it's OK with them." If they made a public statement "we are not ok
with this, but the app stays anyways" is everyone satisfied now? Everyone
knows google is in favour of womens right. People want them to take it down
because they think google won't, so it gives them an opportunity to complain
about how sexist google is. Then the next time something happens regarding
women near google, they'll say wow google is so sexist remember how they made
women get permissions slips to travel? When in fact google is completely
powerless before the might of a nation state, and the worst they can do is
make saudi arabia host the apk on their own website.

~~~
apostacy
> They're curating for user experience, not for political opinions. If someone
> uploaded a vim clone google isn't taking a stance in the editor war by
> letting it stay up.

That may have been true in 2015. But no, Google us curating for political
reasons. Google claims that they are concerned about things like the safety of
women and LGBT groups. They have banned apps like Gab.com for purely quite
flimsy political reasons. So you would think that Google would have no problem
banning this app.

Thus, their approving of an app which literally facilitates patriarchal
misogyny on a nation-wide scale, while banning apps that simply make
misogynist jokes, is colossal hypocrisy on their part.

------
q3k
Interesting comments in the Play Store:
[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=sa.gov.moi&hl=...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=sa.gov.moi&hl=en&showAllReviews=true)

~~~
julianz
Wow, some serious quality astroturfing there. Who knew that every single Saudi
man suddenly wanted to write exactly five lines of effusive praise about their
government's app on the same day!

~~~
kissickas
Never underestimate the power of Saudi twitter (not just their bots, which
surely do exist).

------
devoply
Couldn't women use this app in the place of their husbands/guardians by faking
their info to escape?

~~~
sanxiyn
Yes they can, which is an improvement over previous procedure involving
physical presense. Saudi feminist activists are actually against removing the
app because that makes escape harder.

------
pbreit
“Slippery slope” defined. Once you start deleting apps/speech, the requests
and outrage become never-ending.

~~~
stupidcar
"Slippery slope fallacy" defined. Simply agreeing to outlaw some things —
child pornography, incitement to murder, violation of human rights — doesn't
set you on an irreversible course to outlawing everything. Partial regulation
by community consensus is a fundamental tenet of all human civilisation.

~~~
pbreit
I think there's a big difference between opinion-driven censorship and legal-
driven.

------
scarejunba
Guys, come on, please. This app is an improvement for women in Saudi Arabia.
It lowers the barrier to their being able to travel. It isn't always about
just keeping your hands clean. You also have to sometimes help people. And it
may leave your principles sullied but what are those rigid rules good for if
they don't help someone be free.

If we say we're not going to participate in this and then we turn our backs on
them we've made their lives so much harder and given them no help. Tomorrow
you'll forget you participated in an outraged comment thread and move on.

But Saudi women will still be there. And all that they'd have for it all is
that their lives are harder.

Please, refrain from boarding the outrage train this time.

------
Chutzpah3
I am not a big fan of Islamic regimes and the Islamic law but then I think
American citizens should realize that not all other countries share their
values and American corporations are not beholden to any values American
society might pretend to have.

I would rather ask American people pressurize their government from not
selling weapons to Saudis and not to protect their Royal family. That does
1000x damage to Saudi women and American values more that Google making things
simple for Saudi Arabian women to move around.

Would you rather have a scenario where a woman needs to wait for the husband
to drive to the airport and permit her to travel ?

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intopieces
On a completely unrelated note, I like the app's logo, it's a reduction of the
app's Arabic name. It would normally look like this: أبشر

------
reaperducer
I'd forgotten about this issue. Now that Google has made it an issue again,
let's hope that means Apple will make its response public soon.

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throw2016
How the mighty have fallen. From once defending freedom and liberty to
advocating looking the other way when an app that grossly violates the basic
human rights of an entire gender shows up.

The top voted comment betrays the current moral compass of the tech community,
nothing is too regressive to not 'normalize' and hand wave away.

But given the community's U turn from freedom lovers to supporters of invasive
profiling and eager builders of surveillance systems this yet more evidence of
the community's dramatic slide into irrelevance, unless the conversation is
about startups or money.

The good news is for those with some moral spine this is not going to fly.
There is no way Google or Apple can continue to host this app once it is
widely known. Others will fight and win this battle while you plot your next
billion dollar unicorn to 'save the world'.

------
chriselles
Very interesting to see Google retain an app designed to shackle Saudi women
with digital chains.

While Google employees openly express discontent with Google’s involvement
with US DOD projects.

Gen 1 Silicon Valley was built on a foundation of US Defense funding.

How much is Saudi/Qatari/Emirati sovereign wealth fund money funding the
current generation of Silicon Valley?

I’ve worked with numerous women from conservative islamic countries.

All but onee are now settled legally in countries with considerably more
freedoms for females.

One is still working with the sword of Damocles dangling overhead in terms of
arranged marriage.

One female GSB classmate of mine is Egyptian working in Saudi Arabia in a
tenuous position without a male family sponsor/guardian.

Their country, their rules......

But our countries and companies, our rules.

Some consistent backbone by Google would be nice to see, not just in countries
where the consequences of having a backbone are minimal.

