Google recommends all North America employees work from home over coronavirus fears

• Google has advised all of its employees in North America, about 100,000, to work remotely in response to coronavirus concerns, sources inside the company tell Business Insider.
• Google had previously instructed its offices in the Bay Area, Dublin, and Seattle to avoid coming into the office.
• The majority of Google's 100,000-plus employees are based in North America, and the policy change represents one of the most sweeping remote-work orders of any company to date.
• The company is the latest in a string of tech giants, including Apple and Microsoft, to advise its employees to avoid coming into the office.
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Google is recommending that all of its tens of thousands of North American employees work from home, its latest move to try and protect its employees from the growing coronavirus outbreak.

On Tuesday, the California-based search engine giant sent out a memo to its workforce informing that it was now changing its policies to recommend workers work remotely, sources familiar with the matter said. The move comes after Google previously gave its employees in the California Bay Area the option of working from home.

A Google spokesperson confirmed the order via email.

COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, has sickened more than 113,000 people and killed nearly 4,000, and is causing mounting disruption around the globe - disrupting supply chains and forcing the closure of corporate offices and major events.

Many major US tech companies have instituted remote work policies for at least some of their employees, including Apple and Facebook. Industry events including Mobile World Congress, F8, and I/O have been cancelled, and on Friday, the SXSW tech and culture festival in Austin, Texas was also cancelled.

Google has more than 100,000 employees around the globe - the majority of them in North America - and a similar number again of contract workers.

Last week, the company barred all of its employees from traveling internationally after an employee in its Zurich office tested positive for the coronavirus.

This story is developing ...