Condusiv Technologies - Controversy

Controversy

In 2000, the inclusion of the functionality of the Home version of Diskeeper in Microsoft Windows 2000's Disk Defragmenter was the subject of an investigation by the German Federal Office of Security in Information Technology (BSI), which looked into whether Diskeeper poses a security threat to users by spying on users. In Germany the law bars state and federal governments from doing business with a member of the Church of Scientology, a government policy that has been criticized by the US State Department in 1999 and in a 1998 UN Report as discriminatory and government-condoned harassment. A Microsoft spokesman stated that Microsoft had extensively tested Diskeeper for security breaches and found the tool had no ability to store and transmit data on users, and there was no data transfer involved in its processes, but bowed to pressure, allowing users the option to remove it. On November 5, 2008, Diskeeper's former CIO, Alexander Godelman, and Automation Planning Officer Marc Le Shay jointly filed suit in Los Angeles Superior Court for improper dismissal. In the complaint they allege that the company required training in Hubbard Management courses, which are based on the management technology of L. Ron Hubbard, founder of Scientology, as a condition of employment, and that failure to comply was cause for their dismissal. The plaintiffs cited this as a violation of the California Fair Employment and Housing Act and requested an injunction against the delivery of the courses at Diskeeper. On January 27, 2009, Diskeeper filed a motion to strike the proposed injunction, citing, without conceding that Hubbard Management Technology is religious in nature, legal precedence of religious based practices in business being protected by the First Amendment. On February 18, 2009 the motion to strike was granted and the proposed injunction removed from the case. On June 24, 2009 the case was dismissed in its entirety.