IBM - Digital Audit (Digital & Technology Domain)

Enterprise Technology Stack & Vendor Relationships

• No public evidence identified that IBM holds direct licensing or subscription relationships, as a customer, with Israeli-founded security vendors such as Check Point, Wiz, SentinelOne, CyberArk, NICE, Verint, or Claroty for its own internal enterprise infrastructure.
• IBM has instead acquired, rather than merely licensed, a series of Israeli-founded cybersecurity companies, embedding Israeli-origin technology directly into its own core security product lines. Trusteer, an Israel/US mobile, application and fraud-security specialist, was acquired in August 2013 for a reported $800 million–$1 billion ¹.
• In May 2023, IBM acquired Polar Security, an Israeli-founded cloud data-security posture management (DSPM) startup, for a reported $60 million ²³.
• IBM acquired Cloudigo, an Israeli data-center infrastructure and networking company, in September 2017 ⁴.
• Trusteer’s and Polar Security’s technology has been folded into IBM Security’s core fraud-protection and cloud-DSPM product lines on an ongoing basis rather than operated as a peripheral or divested asset ¹²³.
• Red Hat, IBM’s wholly owned subsidiary, has designated Matrix IT Ltd. as its longstanding “main distributor” of Red Hat solutions and services in Israel ⁵. Research aggregated by Who Profits indicates that, beginning in April 2024, Matrix started deploying Red Hat OpenShift as part of the Israeli government’s “Nimbus” cloud programme, with reported end users including the Israeli Ministry of Defense and state-owned weapons manufacturers Israel Aerospace Industries and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems ⁶⁷.

Surveillance, Biometrics & Retail Technology

• No public evidence identified that IBM uses or resells Trigo, BriefCam, AnyVision/Oosto, or Trax facial-recognition or retail-analytics technology in its own operations.
• IBM ended general-purpose facial recognition sales in 2020, citing concerns about mass surveillance and racial profiling ⁸⁹; Who Profits and Storebrand treat IBM’s continued operation of biometric identity-management systems for the Israeli state as standing in tension with that stated 2020 policy ⁸⁹¹⁰.
• IBM Israel designed, and since 2019 has operated, the “Eitan” central database of Israel’s Population, Immigration and Borders Authority (PIBA) - a biometric population registry recording personal data, including ethnic and religious identity, of citizens and non-citizens in Israel and the occupied Palestinian and Syrian territories ⁶⁷. The contract was originally awarded in 2017 for a reported value of roughly $240 million (alternately cited as approximately NIS 840 million for the initial award, exceeding NIS 800 million cumulatively between 2018 and 2021), with operations reportedly extending to 2035 ⁷.
• IBM held a further 2021 PIBA contract, valued at NIS 5.6 million, for remote biometric identification services ⁷.
• In December 2020, IBM Israel and Elbit Systems jointly contracted with PIBA for the “Marom” e-visa project (approximately NIS 18 million), covering online visa applications and pre-passenger arrival data collection; a further IBM Israel PIBA “Marom” contract has been reported covering February 2024–February 2025, valued at NIS 1,278,564 ⁷.
• Who Profits’ 2022 company feature additionally states that IBM provides systems supporting Israeli prison administration and holds IT infrastructure contracts with Israeli intelligence services, and describes a reported “skin-tone search” capability in a recognition system; this specific claim is sourced to a single NGO document and could not be corroborated against a second independent source in the underlying research ¹¹.
• IBM has been the primary computer and software supplier to Israel Police since 1975 ⁷¹¹, a relationship confirmed still active via a November 2025 sole-source contract for IBM DataPower Gateway products running through January 2031, and a separate IBM MQ software maintenance contract running through December 2030 ⁷.

Cloud Infrastructure, Data Residency & Sovereign Cloud Participation

• No public evidence identified that IBM operates a dedicated local IBM Cloud “region” in Israel, unlike AWS, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure, and Oracle, which have announced or built local Israeli cloud regions.
• IBM does maintain Israel-based data-center-adjacent infrastructure through its September 2017 acquisition of Cloudigo ⁴ and through IBM Research Israel facilities in Haifa, Givatayim, and Be’er Sheva ¹².
• IBM, alongside Microsoft and Oracle, competed for the original 2021 Project Nimbus government cloud tender but lost to the Google/Amazon consortium, which was awarded the $1.2 billion contract; IBM was not a direct Nimbus prime contractor ¹³¹⁴.
• Red Hat, via Israeli distributor Matrix, began supplying its OpenShift platform into the Nimbus cloud ecosystem starting in April 2024, with reported Nimbus end users including the Israeli Ministry of Defense, Israel Aerospace Industries, and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems ⁶⁷; this represents an indirect, subcontracted linkage (Red Hat → Matrix → Nimbus) rather than a direct IBM-Nimbus prime contract.
• Red Hat Israel’s OpenShift-based “operational cloud” for the Israeli military’s Mamram central computing directorate is built for military data-center consolidation and edge computing across Air Force, Ground Forces, Navy, and Intelligence Directorate units, described by the IDF as a “business partner” relationship and by Red Hat executives as viewing the military as their “leading customer” ⁶⁷¹⁵; the deployment has reportedly been in place since 2017–2018.
• Background reporting from 2016 on a major Israeli military data-center contract then up for competitive tender illustrates the pre-Nimbus military IT procurement landscape in which IBM has subsequently operated as a supplier ¹⁶.

Defence, Intelligence & Security Sector Technology Relationships

• IBM Israel and Red Hat Israel, both wholly owned IBM subsidiaries, have held a series of Israeli military IT contracts: hundreds of millions of USD in 2011 for storage and central servers; approximately $20 million or more in 2017 for operation and maintenance of Israeli military computing centers; and a 25-year, roughly $1 billion contract awarded in 2020 (shared with Malam Team, with some sources citing approximately $275 million as IBM’s/partner share) to serve as IT provider for three new Israeli Ministry of Defense regional logistics centers ⁶⁷¹⁷.
• Red Hat’s Mamram-linked OpenShift operational cloud, deployed since 2018, is described as facilitating information-sharing across Israel’s Military Intelligence Directorate, Air Force, Ground Forces, and Navy ⁶⁷¹⁵.
• No public evidence identified linking IBM to the development, sale, or maintenance of offensive cyber tools, exploit brokering, or “digital weapons” for Israeli state actors.
• No public evidence identified of an operational relationship between IBM and either Cellebrite or NSO Group.

AI, Algorithmic & Autonomous Systems

• No public evidence identified of IBM directly supplying AI/ML or computer-vision systems to Israeli military or intelligence bodies for targeting or security operations.
• IBM Watson Health’s Israel-linked AI work identified in this research is exclusively civilian and medical: a licensing partnership with Israeli startup MedyMatch for head-trauma and stroke imaging analysis, integrated into Watson Health’s global hospital offering ¹⁸.
• A claim that IBM provided the initial technology underlying the Israeli military’s “Lavender” AI-assisted targeting system could not be corroborated against primary reporting on Lavender, which attributes its origin to internal Unit 8200 development; No public evidence identified connecting IBM to the Lavender system, and the claim is excluded from findings as unverified.
• No public evidence identified that IBM’s AI models were trained on, or given access to, intercepted communications or surveillance-derived datasets from Israel or the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
• No public evidence identified of IBM providing autonomous targeting, threat-detection, or tracking systems to Israeli military or security forces.
• A February 2025 Associated Press investigation, reported via the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, found that Amazon, Google, and Microsoft provide cloud and AI services used directly in Israeli military intelligence and targeting workflows, and separately noted that “Cisco, Dell, and Red Hat, an IBM subsidiary, also provide cloud computing” to the same ecosystem ¹⁹ - the clearest evidence tying an IBM entity to the AI-adjacent military cloud-computing supply chain, albeit for infrastructure rather than AI or targeting software itself.

Technology Ecosystem & R&D Footprint

• IBM’s Israel R&D presence traces to 1972, when the IBM Israel Scientific Center was founded at the Technion in Haifa ¹²²⁰.
• IBM Research Israel currently operates in Haifa, Givatayim, and Be’er Sheva, described as one of IBM’s largest labs outside the United States, with more than 3,000 employees reported across Israeli R&D sites - Haifa, Tel Aviv, Herzliya, Rehovot, and Jerusalem Technology Park - as of 2023 ⁶¹². The Haifa Research Lab was reported renovated and reopened on the University of Haifa campus in summer 2024 ¹².
• A Be’er Sheva cyber research center opened in 2018 in the Gav-Yam high-tech park, adjacent to an Israeli military telecommunications base and Computer Service Directorate campus, as part of an Israeli Ministry of Defense-led “Southern Relocation” plan integrating military cyber-unit veterans into the technology sector ⁶⁷.
• IBM’s Israel-linked acquisitions include Trusteer (2013, $800 million–$1 billion) ¹, Cloudigo (2017, data-center infrastructure) ⁴, and Polar Security (2023, approximately $60 million, cloud DSPM) ²³.
• IBM Research partnered with the Technion and Hebrew University of Jerusalem, announced September 2022, to fund AI PhD research marking 50 years of IBM Research in Israel ²¹. No public evidence identified of joint patent filings specifically resulting from this partnership; it is described in available sourcing as a funding and research collaboration rather than an IP co-ownership arrangement.

Civil Society Scrutiny & Regulatory History

• Who Profits Research Center has published a dedicated report, “IBM: A Major Facilitator of Israel’s Surveillance and Security Apparatus,” documenting the Eitan/PIBA system, military contracts, and police contracts ⁷, supplemented by a 2022 company feature with further detail ¹¹ and a general company profile ⁶. The American Friends Service Committee’s Investigate database maintains a corroborating IBM company page ²².
• UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese’s report A/HRC/59/23, “From economy of occupation to economy of genocide” (30 June 2025), names IBM as having “been responsible for training military and intelligence personnel, as well as managing the central database of Israel’s Population, Immigration and Borders Authority (PIBA) that stores the biometric data of Palestinians,” grouping IBM with Alphabet, Amazon, and Microsoft as “central to Israel’s surveillance apparatus and the ongoing Gaza destruction” ²³²⁴. The report also references BlackRock’s approximately 8.6% shareholding in IBM in its investor-linkage analysis ²⁴.
• OHCHR separately maintains a database of business enterprises operating in connection with Israeli settlements pursuant to Human Rights Council resolutions 31/36 and 53/25, a monitoring mechanism relevant to ongoing civil-society scrutiny of companies including IBM ²⁵.
• Storebrand, a Norwegian asset manager with roughly $74.5 billion in assets under management, divested approximately £110 million (~$139 million) of IBM shares in March 2024, citing IBM’s supply of biometric database technology “used to implement apartheid” in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and stating that IBM was “not willing to discuss” the issue when Storebrand sought dialogue ⁸⁹¹⁰.
• IBM is listed among companies researched for European financial-institution ties in the Don’t Buy Into Occupation 2024 and 2025 reports ²⁶²⁷, and appears in the compiled “List of companies involved in the Gaza war” ²⁸.
• Following the events of October 7, 2023, IBM employees reportedly pressed leadership for transparency and limits on Gaza-related military work; CEO Arvind Krishna’s remark - “We operate in Israel, but we also operate in Saudi Arabia. What do those countries want us to do? And what is it they consider to be correct behavior?” - drew internal criticism as deferring to state preference over independent ethics review ²⁹. IBM’s own public statement on the war, issued by Krishna in October 2023, addressed the conflict without addressing IBM’s Israel-based government contracts ³⁰.
• No public evidence identified of export-control actions, sanctions investigations, or regulatory inquiries specifically targeting IBM’s Israel-related technology sales. IBM’s April 2026 $17 million U.S. Department of Justice False Claims Act settlement concerns domestic DEI hiring practices and is unrelated to Israel/OPT activity; it is noted here only to flag it as out of scope for this domain ³¹.

End Notes