Dozens of Ukrainian citizens filed a series of lawsuits in Texas this week, accusing some of the largest US chip companies of negligently failing to track chips that evade export restrictions. Those chips were ultimately used to power Russian and Iranian weapons systems, leading to wrongful deaths last year.
Their complaints allege that for years, Texas Instruments (TI), AMD and Intel have ignored public reporting, government warnings and shareholder pressure to track the final destinations of chips and shut down suspicious distribution channels sending chips to sanctioned actors in Russia and Iran.
Ukrainian Citizens’ legal team alleged in a press statement that tech companies continued to use “high-risk” channels, without any strengthening of controls, prioritizing profits over human lives.
According to the Kyiv Independent, chief lawyer Mikal Watts told reporters at a press conference on Wednesday that all intermediaries placing bulk online orders to satisfy chip companies had to check a box to confirm that the shipments would not be sent to sanctioned countries.
“There are export lists,” Watts said. “We know exactly what requires a license and what doesn’t. And the companies know who they’re selling to. But instead, they rely on a checkbox that says, ‘I’m not shipping Putin.’ That’s all. No enforcement. No accountability.”
As the chip companies reportedly looked the other way, innocent civilians suffered five attacks, detailed in the lawsuits, in which weapons containing their chips were used. This includes one of the deadliest attacks in Kiev, where Ukraine’s largest children’s hospital was targeted in July 2024. Some civilians who were seriously injured in the attacks filed lawsuits, while others lost loved ones and experienced emotional trauma.
The lawsuits allege that Russia would not be able to achieve its goals without chips supplied by American companies. He alleged that the chips, considered the brains of weapons systems including drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles, help enable Russia’s war against Ukrainian civilians.
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