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More than 200 contractors who worked on evaluating and improving Google’s AI products have been laid off without warning in at least two rounds of layoffs last month. The move comes amid an ongoing fight over pay and working conditions, according to workers who spoke to WIRED.

In the past few years, Google has outsourced its AI rating work—which includes evaluating, editing, or rewriting the Gemini chatbot’s response to make it sound more human and “intelligent”—to thousands of contractors employed by Hitachi-owned GlobalLogic and other outsourcing companies. Most raters working at GlobalLogic are based in the US and deal with English-language content. Just as content moderators help purge and classify content on social media, these workers use their expertise, skill, and judgment to teach chatbots and other AI products, including Google’s search summaries feature called AI Overviews—the right responses on a wide range of subjects. Workers allege that the latest cuts come amid attempts to quash their protests over issues including pay and job insecurity.

These workers, who often are hired because of their specialist knowledge, had to have either a master’s or a PhD to join the super rater program, and typically include writers, teachers, and people from creative fields.