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Palantir is using War on Terror tools to track American citizens

bloomberg.com

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Re: Palantir is using War on Terror tools to track American citizens

#261

Post by chrismcb »

RedTennisRacket wrote: post #174
opportune wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Law enforcement uses dragnet warrantless surveillance to gather data (such as who is calling whom, who is in physical proximity with whom). That data is loaded into Palantir's software. Law enforcement uses that data to acquire admissible evidence of the perpetrators' crimes. This is the crucial step, because although the original evidence couldn't be admissible in court due to its collection without a warrant, it ca…

You raise several good points, but a few clarifications here: - In our software that we deploy to police departments, generally the origin of any piece of information is tracked, as well as when it was entered and by who. The intention with this is to prevent this (and other) kinds of abuse. Malicious users can still abuse the system and do a parallel construction e.g. outside of our system or maybe in a way that the…

> But once you see all of the bad things LE can prevent thanks to our software, it becomes pretty easy to believe in, even if individual bad actors exist (and always will), like racist cops, cops that abuse their power, etc

NO! The ends don't justify the means. If we give up our freedoms, LE can prevent a lot of bad things. But it isn't worth it. Abuse of power is one reason we have checks and balances. If I understand correctly, checks and balances and due process are thrown out the window. And the justification is simply that LE prevented some bad things... But at what cost?

Re: Palantir is using War on Terror tools to track American citizens

#263

Post by sschueller »

noir_lord wrote: post #108
sschueller wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what sanctions are for. But I highly doubt the EU will ever sanction the US as they are so dependant on them.

EU has more people and an equivalent sized economy. The EU could stand up to the US if they felt it mattered. Other than defence partnerships the EU is no more dependent on the US than the US is on the EU. It's a two way street. Unless you think the US would be happy to walk a way from the largest single market in the world (by GDP).

The USD is currently 62.70%[1] of all currency reserves. If you lose the ability to trade in dollars you are screwed and the US knows this.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reserve_currency

Re: Palantir is using War on Terror tools to track American citizens

#264

Post by gberger »

drcongo wrote: post #49
common_ wrote: post #30

Pop Quiz: Which two companies had their first office at 101 University Avenue in Palo Alto? The answer says quite a lot, I think.

I've found Piazza's Fine Foods Inc and PhysioTouch Inc. Not sure what I'm supposed to take away from this answer though.

Facebook

Re: Palantir is using War on Terror tools to track American citizens

#265

Post by stef25 »

otakucode wrote: post #253
RedTennisRacket wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there are a couple of misconceptions about FOIAs, our software and the law in general here... - FOIAs cannot be used to obtain specific information about persons, this kind of information is protected. In the EU under the GDPR however, you can get some of this information (about yourself only) -- but I think law enforcement agencies are probably exempt from this (not sure, but would make sense.) - Our softwar…

There have been court cases already wherein, for example, a person was stopped for a DUI and subjected to a breathalyzer test. The defense lawyer in that case requested access to the source code of the firmware running on the breathalyzer device in order to determine if it was even a reliable source of accusatory evidence-gathering. It is under that sort of situation I imagine a law enforcement body being led to turn…

Here in Belgium, every speeding fine you get mentions the number of the calibration report of the camera and supposedly you can request this report and if it's absent, incorrect or outdated you don't pay the fine.

Re: Palantir is using War on Terror tools to track American citizens

#266

Post by stef25 »

creaghpatr wrote: post #152
dangerlibrary wrote: post #129

> The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services uses Palantir to detect Medicare fraud. Having worked in this field, I can say that this is hilarious overkill. The vast majority (in dollar terms) of Medicare/Medicaid fraud is drug companies misreporting their Average Market Price (AMP), the critical variable in how much they get paid. In 2012, Glaxo settled(!) a small bundle of cases, some of which I worked on, fo…

Medicare fraud is estimated to be around $60B per year or 10% of the whole budget. So if Palantir can decrease that rate by 1 or 2% then it's tough to call that overkill http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/medicare-funds-totaling-60-bi... >Going even further back, in 1998, a Senate investigation into Medicare fraud found $6 million in payments to a “business” whose fake address would have been smack in the middle of the M…

These things could be fixed by simple address verification. Amazing they have to wait for something like Palantir.

Re: Palantir is using War on Terror tools to track American citizens

#267

Post by prepend »

jawns wrote: post #72
prepend wrote: post #59

This isn’t Palantir, this is the companies who buy Palantir software. The data from JPMorganChase isn’t visibile to Palantir as an organization, but to the bank. This headline is weird and as accurate as “Microsoft knows everything about you” because the bank uses SQL Server. Or “the Python developers” because python and pandas is used to link a bunch of data together. Since this is Bloomberg, I would expect them to…

Is it really the case that data does not cross boundaries among Palantir clients? And that the algorithms used by any given client are only informed by the data that client provides?

I’ve used them on prem and hosted. For on prem, definitely. It’s like any other big install of software (sql server cluster, oracle financials). All on site, no data out. Brought in 3rd party data, shared no data out.

Cloud same, but they host and promise not to do anything. Like any other enterprise cloud product.

The only data they gave us was either open sets like weather or census or stuff anyone can buy like Quintiles. So there was no “magic data set” we could mix in or something.

Re: Palantir is using War on Terror tools to track American citizens

#268

Post by prepend »

creaghpatr wrote: post #99
jawns wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it really the case that data does not cross boundaries among Palantir clients? And that the algorithms used by any given client are only informed by the data that client provides?

Unless proven otherwise, then that is hearsay.

Good point, but this is the risk for every cloud hosted software. So every AWS and azure product has this suspicion that’s impossible or extremely difficult to remove.

If you’re really paranoid, then all non-OSS software.

So again, why is Palantir more worrisome than Salesforce?

Re: Palantir is using War on Terror tools to track American citizens

#269

Post by prepend »

24gttghh wrote: post #92
prepend wrote: post #59

This isn’t Palantir, this is the companies who buy Palantir software. The data from JPMorganChase isn’t visibile to Palantir as an organization, but to the bank. This headline is weird and as accurate as “Microsoft knows everything about you” because the bank uses SQL Server. Or “the Python developers” because python and pandas is used to link a bunch of data together. Since this is Bloomberg, I would expect them to…

This is covered further down in the article: >The military success led to federal contracts on the civilian side. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services uses Palantir to detect Medicare fraud. The FBI uses it in criminal probes. The Department of Homeland Security deploys it to screen air travelers and keep tabs on immigrants.

But that’s using the data that DHS, or FBI, or CMS has already. It’s not using some Facebook-sleazy data source. It’s not data reuse, but algorithm reuse. And algorithm is a stretch as it’s like teaching people how to use graph databases.
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