The Ethical Breakdown of the Companies You Use Every Day
Before you finish breakfast, you will have interacted with at least four companies that are currently facing major regulatory actions, lawsuits, or documented labour violations. By dinner, the count will reach ten.
This is not an accusation. It is arithmetic. The companies that make your phone, serve your coffee, deliver your packages, and run your laptop all carry documented records in court filings and regulatory enforcement actions. Here is what a single day looks like when you trace the evidence. For the full picture of how consumer brands perform, see our breakdown of the biggest consumer brands' ethics scores.
Morning: Your Phone, Your Feed, Your Search
6:30 AM -- You check your iPhone
The phone in your hand was assembled using minerals from supply chains that the Democratic Republic of Congo alleges, in criminal complaints filed in 2026, involve conflict minerals and the cover-up of war crimes. The leather case you might have bought a few years ago no longer exists -- Apple eliminated leather from all products, replacing it with FineWoven, a textile made from 68% post-consumer recycled content. PETA named Apple its 2023 Company of the Year.
Apple scores +40 on Kind to Animals and +40 on Respect for Cultures & Communities, driven by indigenous language preservation and community education partnerships. But Apple scores -30 on No War, No Weapons and -40 on Planet-Friendly Business -- despite matching 100% of electricity with renewables, total emissions remain above 15 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent. The CFPB penalised Apple $25 million in 2024 for deceptive Apple Card practices (-40 on Fair Money & Economic Opportunity).
Apple's average integrity score: -3
7:00 AM -- You scroll Instagram and WhatsApp
By the time you close Instagram, the app has logged your scroll speed, dwell time, and engagement patterns -- data that, according to internal research Meta allegedly suppressed, feeds an algorithm that multiple U.S. states argue is designed to be addictive. Tribal nations filed lawsuits in 2024 and 2025 alleging the platform contributed to Native youth suicides.
Meta scores -70 on Safe & Smart Tech, reflecting billions in privacy penalties across three continents -- including a $1.4 billion facial recognition settlement and a EUR 91 million fine for storing passwords in plain text. Its Better Health for All score is -60, driven by the youth mental health litigation. Its Honest & Fair Business score is -60.
In January 2025, content moderation policy changes allow users to refer to LGBTQ+ people as mentally ill, contributing to a -50 on Respect for Cultures & Communities.
Meta's average integrity score: -39
7:30 AM -- You Google something
Your search query joins the data of 8.5 billion searches processed daily. When 136 million Americans thought they were browsing privately in Chrome's "Incognito" mode, Google was tracking them anyway -- a practice documented in a 2024 class action settlement that forced the company to purge billions of data files.
Alphabet scores -80 on No War, No Weapons. In February 2026, the company removed its pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance. It holds a $1.2 billion contract with the Israeli government and a $9 billion Pentagon cloud contract. Employees who protested were fired.
Its Safe & Smart Tech score is -70. Its Respect for Cultures & Communities score is -50, following YouTube's rollback of hate speech protections, $50 million and $28 million class-action settlements for systemic racial bias, and over 200 allegations of fuelling gendered harm.
Google's average integrity score: -29
8:00 AM -- You grab a Starbucks
Your barista may be working at a store where the NLRB found "egregious and widespread misconduct" in anti-union activity. The CEO who oversees this policy earned 6,666 times the median employee's pay in 2024.
Starbucks scores +60 on Kind to Animals, driven by 100% cage-free eggs in North America, pasture-grazing dairy standards, and elimination of routine antibiotics. But it scores -40 on Fair Pay & Worker Respect and -30 on Fair Trade & Ethical Sourcing after lawsuits alleged coffee sourced from farms implicated in forced labour and child labour. Its Safe & Smart Tech score is -40 after biometric data collection lawsuits.
Starbucks' average integrity score: -10
Afternoon: Your Orders, Your Lunch
12:00 PM -- You order from Amazon
Your package will be picked, packed, and shipped by a worker whose productivity is tracked second-by-second through a handheld scanner. France fined Amazon 32 million euros for this practice in 2024. In February 2025, the NLRB found that Amazon illegally enforced its Unpaid Time Off policy -- a system where warehouse workers accrue points toward termination for taking sick days.
Amazon scores -50 on Fair Pay & Worker Respect, with seven substantiated labour-law violations in three years, including OSHA fines for unsafe conditions. Its Honest & Fair Business score is -50 after a $2.5 billion settlement for deceptive Prime subscription practices. Its Kind to Animals score is -50 despite Whole Foods' sourcing standards, due to slow progress on crate-free pork (only 30% as of 2024). Supplier links to Uyghur exploitation push Fair Trade & Ethical Sourcing to -30.
Amazon scores +50 on Respect for Cultures & Communities, driven by $9.7 billion in diverse supplier spending and a memorandum of understanding with the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation.
Amazon's average integrity score: -25
12:30 PM -- You grab a McDonald's
McDonald's scores -60 on Planet-Friendly Business, with over 60 million tons of CO2 equivalent emissions in 2023. Its Safe & Smart Tech score is -60 after a March 2023 data breach in South Korea affecting 4.87 million customers, fines for insufficient access controls, failure to destroy expired personal data for 766,846 customers, and delayed breach notifications.
Its Better Health for All score is -50. An E. coli outbreak in late 2024 linked to contaminated onions prompted a $100 million remediation plan. The U.S. Department of Labor found in May 2023 that franchisees in Kentucky employed over 300 children in violation of labour laws, including two 10-year-olds working unpaid until 2 a.m. Franchisees were fined $212,000.
McDonald's average integrity score: -18
1:00 PM -- Your Nestle snack
Nestle scores -60 on Better Health for All. In 2024, 62% of its net sales came from products with health star ratings below 3.5, meaning the majority of what it sells has limited nutritional value. The Global Access to Nutrition Index found that its product portfolio is least healthy in low-income countries.
Its Planet-Friendly Business score is -50, with 73 million tons of CO2 equivalent emissions. Its Safe & Smart Tech score is -50 after multiple data breaches, including leaked employee records in Brazil and a breach by threat actor R00TK1T that exposed sensitive internal information and customer data.
Nestle scores +30 on Fair Pay & Worker Respect, driven by achieving 1:1 gender pay equity in 2019 and five consecutive years on Bloomberg's Gender Equality Index.
Nestle's average integrity score: -15
Evening: Your Drinks, Your Shoes, Your Laptop
5:00 PM -- You open a Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola scores -70 on Better Health for All. Its core products are linked to rising obesity, diabetes, and heart disease globally. The WHO classified aspartame, used in its low-calorie alternatives, as "possibly carcinogenic." The company has funded public health conferences without full disclosure.
Its Planet-Friendly Business score is -50, and it was named the world's top plastic polluter for six consecutive years through 2023. In December 2024, Coca-Cola revised down its environmental goals. Los Angeles County filed a lawsuit in November 2024 alleging deceptive practices regarding the recyclability of its plastic bottles.
Coca-Cola's average integrity score: -18
6:00 PM -- You lace up your Nikes
The shoes contain recycled materials -- 78% of Nike, Jordan, and Converse products do. The company behind them achieved a 69% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from a 2015 baseline, one of the strongest climate records in this article.
Nike scores +20 on Planet-Friendly Business and +30 on Respect for Cultures & Communities, supported by the N7 Fund's investments in over 300 indigenous community organisations.
But the Nike app reportedly collects and shares sensitive personal data, including sexual orientation, with third parties (-50 on Safe & Smart Tech). Forced labour non-compliances were found at suppliers in Malaysia, Jordan, and Taiwan (-30 on Fair Trade & Ethical Sourcing). Nike also scores -40 on No War, No Weapons.
Nike's average integrity score: -9
8:00 PM -- You open your laptop
Microsoft scores +50 on Respect for Cultures & Communities, driven by partnerships with over 10 indigenous groups, Inuktitut language preservation on Azure, and 99% employee completion of inclusion training. Its Fair Pay & Worker Respect score is +30 with near-perfect pay equity across gender and racial lines.
Microsoft scores -50 on No War, No Weapons. An estimated 11.9% of its annual revenue comes from defence contracts, including a $22 billion HoloLens contract with the U.S. Army. OpenAI, backed by Microsoft, removed its ban on military use of AI. Its Safe & Smart Tech score is -40 after LinkedIn was sued for sharing private messages to train AI models and the "Recall" feature that screenshots user activity every few seconds.
Microsoft's average integrity score: -5
Your Day in Numbers: The Full Ethics Scorecard
| Company | Ticker | Climate | Workers | Integrity | Tech & Privacy | Peace | Animals | Health | Avg. Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Microsoft | MSFT.US | -30 | +30 | -20 | -40 | -50 | +20 | +10 | -5 |
| Apple | AAPL.US | -40 | 0 | -20 | +10 | -30 | +40 | +10 | -3 |
| Nike | NKE.US | +20 | -30 | 0 | -50 | -40 | -10 | +10 | -9 |
| Starbucks | SBUX.US | 0 | -40 | 0 | -40 | 0 | +60 | 0 | -10 |
| Nestle | NESR.XETRA | -50 | +30 | -20 | -50 | 0 | -20 | -60 | -15 |
| Coca-Cola | KO.US | -50 | -20 | -20 | 0 | -30 | 0 | -70 | -18 |
| McDonald's | MCD.US | -60 | 0 | -10 | -60 | 0 | 0 | -50 | -18 |
| Amazon | AMZN.US | -30 | -50 | -50 | -50 | -40 | -50 | -20 | -25 |
| GOOGL.US | -30 | -40 | -30 | -70 | -80 | +10 | -30 | -29 | |
| Meta | META.US | -10 | -30 | -60 | -70 | -50 | -20 | -60 | -39 |
Scores from -100 to +100. Bold indicates notably strong or weak scores.
End of Day Tally
Across the ten companies you interacted with today, the average integrity score is -17. Not a single company averaged positive.
Here is what one ordinary day of consumer activity adds up to:
- Most common negative dimension: Safe & Smart Tech. Eight of ten companies scored negative on data privacy and responsible technology practices.
- Most common positive dimension: Kind to Animals. Starbucks (+60) and Apple (+40) lead, driven by consumer pressure on cage-free eggs and leather alternatives.
- Largest gap within a single company: Apple, which scores +40 on animal welfare and -40 on climate and financial fairness. The spread between a company's best and worst dimension averaged 80 points.
- Weakest company of the day: Meta at -39 average. Strongest: Apple at -3.
What One Day of Consumer Activity Reveals
The pattern is not that all companies are equally bad. It is that every company has documented liabilities in some dimension, and the dimensions where they score well are often unrelated to the dimensions where they face regulatory action.
Microsoft invests in indigenous language preservation while earning 11.9% of revenue from defence contracts. Starbucks leads on cage-free eggs while its CEO earns 6,666 times the median worker's pay. Nike achieved a 69% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions while forced labour non-compliances appear at its suppliers.
What This Means for Consumers and Investors
Knowing this does not require you to stop using these products. It means you can make informed decisions about where your money goes -- both as a consumer and as an investor.
If you hold index funds, you almost certainly own most of these companies. The S&P 500 alone means Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Meta are your five largest positions. For a look at which boycotted brands overlap with major indices, see our analysis of boycotted companies in 2026.
How We Score
Every score is derived from enforcement records, court settlements, and independent investigations. No corporate self-assessments. Every claim cites its source. Learn more about our methodology.
Run your entire portfolio through our audit tool to see where your money stands. Advisors can use this data to identify ethical exposure in client holdings and have evidence-backed conversations about alignment. See the advisor solution.
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Mashinii provides integrity data for informational purposes. This content does not constitute financial advice.