Open Letter for Technology Giants to Take Action Against Human Trafficking

CONTACT: Waed Al-Nimri, AEHT Communications Director

To Tim Cook, Elon Musk, Sundar Pichai, Mark Zuckerberg, and Leaders in the Technology Sector:

On this day of World Day against Trafficking in Persons, we write to ask for your leadership in protecting human rights by reducing child labor, forced labor, and human trafficking in your supply chains.

This digital era, led by innovations from your companies, has created unprecedented opportunities for connection, learning, and growth. However, it has also exposed new ways for child labor, forced labor, and human trafficking to proliferate.

Technology companies have integrated into every aspect of modern life, affecting how we communicate, work, learn, and entertain. These advancements have undeniably transformed our lives. As the leaders of the world’s most influential companies, you are confronted with a pivotal issue that poses an existential challenge to the progress of innovation and the preservation of human dignity. The extensive influence of your products demands a substantial level of responsibility, especially in sourcing minerals and protecting the dignity of workers and users.

Resources are often extracted from impoverished regions at a high human cost, with children and adults working under inhumane conditions for minimal earnings.  The rare and valuable minerals that are vital to the products offered by your companies are made possible by the human hands that extract these natural resources from the earth, often at the hands of children and those forced to labor.  We believe we can work together to do more in supply chains to ensure these horrific realities are addressed and abolished.

We recognize that Human Rights Policies, Conflict Minerals Policies, and related reports have been developed and that technology companies have been steadfastly working to address human rights, particularly in the mining sector and in supply chains¹. U.S. law² and policies have required the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to promulgate disclosure and reporting regulations regarding the use of conflict minerals from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and adjoining countries. Since 2012, the SEC has adopted a conflict minerals disclosure rule requiring companies to file specialized disclosure reports annually.

The Alliance to End Human Trafficking (AEHT) is a collaborative, faith-based national network that offers education, supports access to survivor services, and engages in advocacy to eradicate human trafficking. We work to inform the public, prevent this assault on human dignity, and assist survivors to live fulfilling lives. Our members include 200+ congregations of Catholic Sisters, coalitions working against human trafficking, and individuals who share our mission.

We call for your companies to take a leadership role through clear, ethical actions and

1. Exploitation-free supply chains: Ensure exploitation-free supply chain practices, including eradicating child labor and modern-day slavery. This means proactive efforts, active management, audit processes, and transparent reporting mechanisms. We stand ready to help facilitate conversations with the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, indigenous worker organizations, and others who share our vision for proactive steps that root out child labor and implement real-life, practical solutions that balance human rights with corporate opportunities for work without slavery and exploitation.
2. The dignity of work and living wages: Commit to ensuring that the communities of labor and resources for your technologies are treated fairly and with dignity. Such communities deserve a fair wage reimbursement since their labor makes technology products possible.
3. Explore alternatives to risky mining:  Explore and invest in new ideas, materials, and designs that require fewer rare, scarce, or ethically problematic resources.  Exiting mines should be done responsibly to protect workers and local and Indigenous communities.
4. Education, training, and resources: Use your materials to educate on the signs of human trafficking and how to report them safely, as well as leverage your influence to spread awareness and address human trafficking and forced labor around the world.
5. Assist victims of human trafficking and forced labor:  Provide resources that will support survivors of trafficking by advocating for and supporting policies that would protect the survivors and bring the perpetrators to account.

The decisions you make today will shape an ethical landscape for technology. Your platforms hold the power to bring people together. We believe the same power can be harnessed to dismantle networks that traffick in human lives. We call for you to join us through collaboration, acknowledgment, and action.

The Alliance to End Human Trafficking is prepared to collaborate, offering our expertise on this topic and amplifying the voices of survivors.

Sincerely,

Katie Boller Gosewisch

Executive Director Alliance to End Human Trafficking

¹ Generally, the Securities and Exchange Commission requires certain annual disclosures on this topic. See https://www.sec.gov/info/smallbus/secg/conflict-minerals-disclosure-small-entity-compliance-guide.htm, https://sustainability.google/reports/alphabet-2021-conflict-minerals-report/, https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/320193/000114036124015633/ef20024616_ex1-01.htm,

² 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act.

About the Alliance to End Human Trafficking:

 Alliance to End Human Trafficking was founded in 2013 by a group of Catholic Sisters committed to ending human trafficking and supporting survivors. They created a national network of resources and support that includes many different congregations of women religious and mission-aligned partners. Today, this member-based organization has grown to include more than 115 congregations and another 100+ individuals and organizations spread throughout the United States. AEHT is also the U.S. member of Talitha Kum, the international network of consecrated life working to end human trafficking.

Category: Press Release