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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

#71

I'm much less concerned with Palantir being used internally by corporations to detect information leaks (although in practice this also means it will be used to quash whistleblowers), since that's at least a viable use for their technology. And it's good that Palantir is pivoting towards less invasive applications of their technology such as supply chain tracking. But the article touches on the biggest issue with Pal…

Can you expand on exactly how Palantir is used for parellel construction?

They dig up data telling the police where to look. The police then look in just the right place and "legitimately find" the evidence that they would never have stumbled on and couldn't have legally known was there.

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

#72
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?

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

#73
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thiel's genuine commitment to freedom is questionable. Also, he's a misogynist and jerk.

I feel these issues are orthogonal. There are plenty of nice people who have no commitment to freedom or privacy, and there are plenty of assholes (and even assholes-to-women!) who are also pretty passionate about both.

If they are orthogonal, then the conjunction is maximally informative...

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

#74

I'm much less concerned with Palantir being used internally by corporations to detect information leaks (although in practice this also means it will be used to quash whistleblowers), since that's at least a viable use for their technology. And it's good that Palantir is pivoting towards less invasive applications of their technology such as supply chain tracking. But the article touches on the biggest issue with Pal…

Can you expand on exactly how Palantir is used for parellel construction?

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 can be used to acquire more evidence. If the warrantless surveillance includes information such as the time and place of where you plan to commit a crime, law enforcement can stop you for a random check on the way there, giving them actual evidence for prosecution. Now that evidence can be used in court, even though the only way law enforcement were able to acquire it was through unconstitutional practices.

The thing about Palantir is that it needs big data to work. Police departments don't just have random chunks of data lying around containing large numbers of connections between large numbers of people - they might have something like that for something like suspected criminal gangs, but that wouldn't be enough data to make Palantir's software worthwhile. So acquiring the data necessary to use Palantir's software requires mass data collection. Some of their mass data collection techniques may not require a warrant, such as using license plate captures, but some does, such as who you're calling.

So does Palantir perform warrantless surveillance themselves? To my knowledge, no. But when they sell their software to law enforcement agencies, they must know that the only way their customer could get bang for their buck is through mass surveillance. In my opinion, the person willingly and knowingly selling tools for oppressive purposes holds a lot of blame for the actual oppression that occurs as a result.

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

#75

I'm much less concerned with Palantir being used internally by corporations to detect information leaks (although in practice this also means it will be used to quash whistleblowers), since that's at least a viable use for their technology. And it's good that Palantir is pivoting towards less invasive applications of their technology such as supply chain tracking. But the article touches on the biggest issue with Pal…

Thiel's genuine commitment to freedom is questionable. Also, he's a misogynist and jerk.

Thank you for bringing your sexism agenda into a discussion on Palantir

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

#76
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not exactly tapping my own research here. Palantir is a big data/spying company, what do you expect from them? Facebook asks you for lots of private data and it's clearly obvious that when you post data on Facebook, Facebook gets that data. So what's the shock that they hold this private data? The only surprising aspect of the current Facebook drama is that they apparently mine your phone for additional data but…

Most of the people knows nothing about all these things, until the media picks up the story. They at most believe Palantir is a Skype stone for elves and that Facebook makes money just running ads just like printed newspaper TV stations and radios run ads on very basic criteria (i.e. different ads during a soap opera than during an action movie), but they're not aware of the depth of analysis FB et al. perform. Examp…

the thing is, articles about how facebook collects private data and analyses it have been running pretty much non-stop for the last few years. I would totally understand the reaction if that hadn't been the case.

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

#77
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thiel's genuine commitment to freedom is questionable. Also, he's a misogynist and jerk.

Thank you for bringing your sexism agenda into a discussion on Palantir

You are most welcome.

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

#78
post #43

Culture flows from the top. Peter Thiel apparently views women's suffrage and poor people as "tough for libertarians [like him]". Can we talk about, well, how problematic it is that a company that has information on just about everyone (and all the power this yields) is lead by someone like this? > As Thiel’s wealth has grown, he’s gotten more strident. In a 2009 essay for the Cato Institute, he railed against taxes,…

[flagged]

if libertarianism is equated with fascism then i believe we have at last reached peak fascism

edit: liberatianism is by its nature less demo-cratic because it reduces the "kratos" part of democracy but it is not fascist because it is not authoritarian. anarchocapitalism is its conclusive endgame.

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

#79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

the lack of democracy is not fascism. Anarchy is non-democratic but is pretty much the exact opposite of fascism. Thiel is a libertarian which is a political system that is neither inherently authoritarian nor democratic. [edit] clarify "inherently". Libertarianism can be a lot of things given its primary focus on economics and contract law.

Since Thiel is a capitalist and not in support of democracy, that means he is either a fascist or an extreme libertarian. Correct me if I'm wrong, but mainstream libertarianism is still democratic, they tend to be supporters of government in the style of the original US constitution. That would mean that if Thiel is non-authoritarian he would be an anarcho-capitalist, which I have a hard time believing he is.

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

#80
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thiel's genuine commitment to freedom is questionable. Also, he's a misogynist and jerk.

Thank you for bringing your sexism agenda into a discussion on Palantir

Do you agree that a company's culture starts from the top?
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