The US National Labor Relations Board has opened an investigation against Google over a possible federal labour law violation, CNBC News reported on Monday. The company will be also investigated over discouraging its workers from unionising.
Google has rejected all the accusations, saying that the workers had been fired for "clear and repeated violations of the company's data security policies".
During their time at Google, the quartet has reportedly challenged the company's activities and called for protests among other Google employees, in particular, over such issues as attempts to contract with the US Defence Department and design a censored search engine for users in China.
Three of the employees, Berland, Waldman, and Rivers, also identify as LGBT activists, and some of their practices involved organising within employee resource groups for trans or gay Googlers – known as "Gayglers" – to pressure the company on issues such as equal benefits for same-sex partnerships.
If the employees' firings have something to do with their internal activism, it would be in violation of US federal labour law.