A bombshell report from the New York Times accused the federal government of working with data processing company Palantir to develop a database of Americans’ private information.
The idea has been criticized as a way for the government to compile sensitive data against naysayers, detractors, or immigrants who could get the boot over their politics. Another interpretation is that the government is simply sharing data between agencies to make processes more efficient, like streamlining tax data or locating illegal immigrants.
‘Palantir never collects data to unlawfully surveil Americans.’
In March, President Trump signed an executive order “ensuring Federal Agencies share critical data, consistent with applicable privacy protections.”
By April, the New York Times was warning that this compilation of data could mean the government would have hands on civilian information like alimony payments, IP addresses, or student loan defaults, all in the same place.
A lot of the data listed would come as no surprise to the average person, given that his Social Security number or criminal history is already firmly in the government’s purview. However, the issue rises with the company Palantir — founded by Trump-supporting mega-donor Peter Thiel — gaining access to all this data and compiling it through government contracts.
As Newsweek reported, Trump may have allegedly tapped Palantir to create a database of Americans’ private information.
Palantir was founded in 2003 by Thiel and Alex Karp, but did not go public until 2020. Karp has publicly boasted about stopping the “far right” in Europe through Palantir’s software and the company’s work with COVID-19 vaccine distribution.
That work is just one of many integrations with the federal government pointed out by the New York Times in a subsequent investigation.
For example, Palantir engineers have worked with the IRS since April to organize data on taxpayers, according to two unnamed government officials.
According to Wired, Palantir also has a $30 million deal to help Immigration and Customs Enforcement to implement software to achieve “near-real-time” tracking on illegal immigrants.
The Social Security Administration and Department of Education are also using Palantir’s data integration and analysis tool called Foundry, according to Yahoo.
Palantir’s response to this firestorm of accusations from left-wing outlets started with directing the Times to a blog post from 2020. Titled “Palantir Is Not a Data Company,” the blog states that the company is not a data broker or seller.
“Unlike many tech companies, our business model is not based on the monetization of personal data,” the tech company wrote. “We do not collect, store, or sell personal data. We don’t use personal data to train proprietary AI or machine learning models to share or resell to other customers.”
On June 3, five days after the report accused Palantir of undermining Americans’ trust, the tech company took to its X page to accuse the New York Times of publishing “blatantly untrue” content.
Echoing its years-old blog post, Palantir said it “never collects data to unlawfully surveil Americans, and our Foundry platform employs granular security protections. If the facts were on its side, the New York Times would not have needed to twist the truth.”
“The Times seeks the facts and the truth,” the outlet replied. “Our article is based on excellent, factual reporting, including conversations with Palantir employees and federal officials who have knowledge of Palantir’s business before the U.S. government.”
Palantir’s Bill Rivers then went on the attack the next day and accused the New York Times itself of collecting and selling data.
“Palantir doesn’t collect data on Americans but The New York Times does,” he wrote. “If you compare third party tracking on NYT vs Palantir websites, NYT makes 38 third-party requests. Palantir makes NONE. They bash Palantir for data privacy but sell and track customer data THEMSELVES.”
Blaze News asked the New York Times about its data collection and whether or not the outlet sells user data to third parties.
Spokesman Charlie Stadtlander said the outlet’s reporting on Palantir is based on “a pursuit of facts and truth about a company with large amounts of contracts with the U.S. government, paid for by American taxpayers.”
“Our reporting is driven by transparency, accountability, and insight for our readers to better understand the forces at play between the government and a large tech company,” Stadtlander continued. “Conflating run-of-the-mill corporate policies with the truths expertly uncovered in this reporting seems to be an attempt at deflection and distraction.”
Stadtlander did not address any collection or sale of user data.
Palantir has a point, though, even if it is a misdirection. News websites are havens of data collection, and the farther east you go, the more prevalent it seems to be.
A 2018 study from Nieman Lab found that European news outlets are rampant with third-party cookies tracking user data. U.K. and Spanish outlets were by far the worst offenders, followed by French, Polish, Finnish, and German news companies.
Websites in just seven European countries averaged 81 third-party cookies per page. Other popular websites (non-news) had just 12 on average.
In the battle of data, the left wing does appear to be winning the Pokemon-style game of collecting it all.
Google, Facebook, and Adobe were ranked as the top three companies collecting data in 2021, according to pCloud.
In 2022, Clario did a deep dive into which apps are tracking user data, including location and contact info. Apple Messages, Snapchat, Instagram, Apple Photos, Safari, and of course Google Maps all ask users for this data.
At the same time Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter (pre-Elon Musk), and Tinder were all using face recognition and environment recognition while seeking access to contacts and images. Of those, only Tinder was not taking in voice data/recognition.
These are not exactly right-wing companies.
‘… playing it safe is the most dangerous thing an administration like Trump’s could do.’
Return’s James Poulos explained that from a tech angle, the federal government is, and has been, in dire need of more security for its data.
“It’s been a rough century for civil libertarians, whose dreams of a Wild West web have been dashed at every turn,” Poulos said. “Almost always the justification has been the hardest one to challenge: national security.”
Poulos says that America is so vulnerable to a systemic attack by China that there is not much of an alternative other than to quickly secure its data all at once.
He added, “The ancients were well aware that in tough times people would often have to accept regimes of a type and severity that fell below normal hopes and expectations. Here we are again. There’s plenty of blame to go around, but with a hand this bad, playing it safe is the most dangerous thing an administration like Trump’s could do.”
While it will continue to be difficult to discern whether any political aisle is trustworthy with your data, it seems clear that while the left wing is busy pointing out right-wing intrusions — as it should — it may also be acting in self-service, introducing a welcomed distraction from its own data mining.
There does exist a third possibility, however: that President Trump is taking a calculated risk by allowing certain actors to secure sensitive information rather than have it fall into the hands of a hostile nation.
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The post Who’s stealing your data, the left or the right? appeared first on TheBlaze.
