By Rita Cook
Correspondent
Texas Metro News
WASHINGTON D.C. – Without getting too far into the weeds of Palantir’s rumored connections to data centers and the overreach of surveillance, I will begin by acknowledging Palantir Technologies builds software platforms that help organize, integrate, and analyze large, messy datasets that does include the profile of a human.
By “profile of a human” I mean the company’s software connects datasets together that can track a person’s travel records, financial data, or case files (for example) to find a person’s patterns.
If left unchecked that capability can be worrisome in that it could enable intrusive surveillance if used aggressively or without oversight.
Some say the data centers, like those popping up all over north Texas are the data holders, I will not get into that topic in this column, but the data does have to be held somewhere.
While Palantir and co-founder Peter Thiel have been government favorites in the past (Palantir was originally created with support from Thiel and In-Q-Tel (the CIA’s venture arm) the company is currently having a lover’s quarrel with the Pentagon.
According to a report, Palantir is battling the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) for the ability to bid for a contract to modernize its data analytics system.
This is important for a variety of reasons since Palantir is already an important player in DC. With this quarrel, the bones of it lie in Palantir’s potential future involvement with foreign military intelligence regarding wars.
In brief, the argument stems from the fact Palantir is reportedly arguing the DIA is wasting taxpayer money and not abiding by the law if they do not allow a commercial solution to modernize data by developing a system that could be in place much faster and cheaper than the DIA’s current struggle with its machine-assisted Analytic Rapid-repository System.
A DIA spokesperson alluded to the fact that the DIA or even Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth could cancel the Machine-assisted Analytic Rapid-repository System program and “fundamentally reimagine the program,” since Palantir and other companies have seen strong advances over the past decade.
As for the concern with Palantir digging its heels even deeper into defense and technology, the company has two main products: Gotham (used heavily by government and defense agencies) and Foundry (used by commercial clients like hospitals, manufacturers, and banks). There has also been a push with AI-assisted workflows through its “AIP” platform.
The “surveillance data centers” concern stems from Palantir’s software that runs on top of data that its customers already own, this can include government systems or commercial cloud environments like AWS, Azure, or private infrastructure.
Where the “Big Brother” concern plays out is government customers that use Palantir tools for intelligence analysis, law enforcement investigations, or defense targeting.
But keep in mind, Palantir does not function as a standalone surveillance agency.
The Gotham platform is an investigative analysis platform used to connect and search across large, disconnected datasets that already exist inside an organization. Think of it less like “AI watching everything” and more like a powerful search-and-reasoning layer over databases that do not normally talk to each other.
As a realistic example it might mean during an intelligence investigation different agencies have separate data like border crossings and travel records; known associates or watchlists; phone metadata; financial transactions; incident reports from field agents and Palantir technology can put it all together in one place and help analyze connections or even help flag patterns. With technology already in existence like this, it would seem Palantir does have a step-up on the DIA’s research regarding the budling of a modern data analytics system that can speak to the winning or preventing of wars in the future.
Rita Cook is a world traveler and writer/editor who specializes in writing on travel, auto, crime and politics. A correspondent for Texas Metro News, she has published 11 books and has also produced low-budget films.
