Microsoft receives gender discrimination lawsuit from former employee

Microsoft has received a lawsuit from one of its former employees, Katie Moussouris. Katie worked in Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing Group for seven years, before she departed last year.

Moussouris claims that Microsoft pays its female employees less than its male equivalents, as well as claiming that they promote male employees to new positions more often than they do with their female employees.

A Press Release, published by her attorneys showed a short summary of the lawsuit:

According to the complaint, "[a]s a result of Microsoft's policies, patterns, and practices, female technical employees receive less compensation and are promoted less frequently than their male counterparts. Microsoft's company-wide policies and practices systematically violate female technical employees' rights and result in the unchecked gender bias that pervades its corporate culture." Plaintiff Katie Moussouris said, "What happened to me is not unique. This case will illuminate the broad patterns of decision-making against women. Fundamentally, this is about fairness and equality.

This has been filed in the US with a Federal Court in Seattle.

It is not the first time Microsoft has been accused of such discrimination, either. In fact, Nancy Williams, who worked in the Azure division last year claimed that Microsoft discriminated against genders.

The new CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, discussed women's rights in the workplace last year, after being misunderstood not long before after he made a comment over women's rights.

So far, Microsoft has not yet responded to the lawsuit, however, their response will certainly be one to look out for, considering numerous other companies have too been accused of gender discrimination over the past year.

Source: WindowsCentral