Apple’s European headquarters in Cork, Ireland has been under a great deal of media scrutiny which revolves around the corporation tax rate. An investigation by the European Commission suggested Apple had incorrectly reported its financial earnings and could be hit with a fine costing up to $8 billion. Today, their headquarters was quickly evacuated after due to a potential security threat which posed a risk to employees. While, information regarding the incident is fairly unknown, Defence Forces told The Independent that explosive ordnance disposal teams were deployed just in case anything terrible occurred.
Once the building had been evacuated, employees had to wait outside for over two hours until they received the all clear. Apple eventually confirmed the evacuation and said it was a precautionary measure due to ‘threatening e-mails’ the company received. Thankfully, there was no harm done and the employees have safely returned to work. However, questions still remain about the hoaxer and their motives. Perhaps they just wanted to cause a scene or protest against Apple’s tax avoidance schemes. Whatever the case, it’s a very foolish move and once traced, could end up with a custodial sentence.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the person in question is apprehended fairly quickly and brought in for questioning. At least for the employees, they only had to deal with a small inconvenience instead of something quite sinister. The world is on high alert in the midst of terrorist attacks and stupid pranks like this don’t help people to feel safe. This certainly isn’t going to be the last hoax of its kind, but the police and security services have to take each threat very seriously. It will be interesting to see if Apple changes their approach with taxation as more pressure is applied from the media and consumers.
https://twitter.com/JoeLeogue/status/689040331090841600/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
#Apple says threatening emails it received lead to the evacuation of its plants in #Cork. #securityalert
— BreakingNews.ie (@stunnah2k11) January 18, 2016
Do you think Apple is employing far too many loopholes to avoid paying tax?
