126 pointsby robin_reala6 hours ago10 comments
  • jpfromlondon5 hours ago
    >In all cases they do not have permission to use the data for their own purposes

    Oh, they don't have permission? probably fine then.

    • oliwarner4 hours ago
      While I agree, permission still means something.

      If they're found to have held onto it, processed it or shared it, they'll be told off very sternly and asked politely to not do it again.

      • Eddy_Viscosity22 hours ago
        Sternly? Hey hey hey, let's not go overboard here.
    • andrewstuart5 hours ago
      Definitely fine.

      All the Palantir employees have read that clause of course.

      In Australia when the biggest health insurer had ALL patient records stolen, the Board of Directors immediately granted themselves very large cash bonuses (true).

    • Oras5 hours ago
      Insert "this is fine" meme
    • tcp_handshaker3 hours ago
      They are sharing it with several other customers of theirs but in a smart way, pretending is done via discovery of their ontology tool and for other countries also... You heard it here first.

      I realized this by talking to several recently hired graduates at several startups. I was shocked at the amount of startups spending money on Palantir. It seems right now, every dumb founder with no idea or market fit, and a lot of dumb money is buying their tools.

      There is a spending AI bubble, and then there is a parallel mini Palantir buy bubble...

    • 3 hours ago
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  • clydethefrog2 hours ago
    LRB had a great article about Palantir and the NHS in their latest issue. [1] What I mostly enjoyed reading is the insight that their actual software is quite "rubbish", something I have seen people mention in discussions here, especially in the early years of Palantir before it became more notorious and well-known. I do believe the "evil company" is part of their marketing to cover up that they are your usual proprietary software with a shitty UI and expensive contract that is being sold to clueless upper management.

    [1] https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v48/n13/peter-geoghegan-and-...

  • alexisread5 hours ago
    Wow this was moved fast off the frontpage! Now on page 3 after 50min. Just FYI.
    • robin_reala4 hours ago
      I was wondering. Usually if something drops a couple of pages suddenly it’s because of the flamewar trigger: the number of comments exceeding the number of upvotes is a proxy measure for something not designed to elucidate meaningful discussion. Here, it dropped when it got to ~90 upvotes to 15 comments, so it wasn’t that trigger. Maybe as it’s a UK-specific story the concentrated geographical voting pattern triggered a voting-ring trigger?
    • graysnow862 hours ago
      Yeah, I caught it on the refresh! Makes one wonder what the impetus was for the change...
    • alexisread4 hours ago
      And this comment is being downvoted as well to hide the fact.
  • numpad05 hours ago
    Is Palantir obsessed with medical records? If so why?

    This is worrying as there recently was a change in the Japanese PII law, relatively unceremoniously passed and enacted, that reclassify mass PII collection including medical data collection as anonymous and consent-free with the condition that anonymization is performed after collection, which, IMO, IANAL, completely nullify the PII law. I can easily "see" Palantir behind it with my tinfoil hat on, but I'm not sure why do anyone want it in the first place. I don't think they need medical data specifically to take people to the back and dispose of the body.

    • kotaKat5 hours ago
      > Is Palantir obsessed with medical records? If so why?

      Daddy Thiel needs a bloodbank. The last one mysteriously died under the guise of a 'suicide'.

      https://www.inc.com/jeff-bercovici/peter-thiel-young-blood.h...

      • numpad02 hours ago
        That's so stupid that it makes total sense. Why can't they just hit deep South Asian scam malls and order a few "pigs" if that's what they want... the whole thing is so low effort. Thanks.
    • gambiting5 hours ago
      I'm guessing because insurance companies would love to put their hands on that data, so it can be repackaged and sold off. Or Palantir can offer a model trained on it, so it's not technically selling the data itself.
  • gambiting5 hours ago
    So, what is going to happen now? Someone in the UK government goes "ooops, sorry" and Palantir gets to keep access to this data? Or are we just going to have another 10 year long enquiry of how exactly this happened that leads to no consequences for anyone while US company siphons up our personal info, again?
  • bananaflag5 hours ago
    Now the deed is done, one cannot undo it.
  • hollow-moe5 hours ago
    "Whoops sorrgy! Your honor, I plead silly :3c"
  • jascination5 hours ago
    This is insanely fucked up, but also unsurprising.
  • runtime_lens5 hours ago
    [flagged]
  • LtWorf5 hours ago
    Many years ago I had a job offer in UK and a friend who was already living there who was very keen on me moving there.

    Honestly every single time there is news about UK, I am glad I didn't take the offer.

    Then again, me being already not very enthusiastic about the place had a role in my decision.

    • happymellon5 hours ago
      Because Palantir have government contracts? Seriously?

      You claim to be in Sweden, then you should surely know that Palantir are very much in bed with the government there including police monitoring.

      • LtWorf2 hours ago
        At least you don't get arrested for protesting in the streets in sweden, unlike UK…
    • gambiting5 hours ago
      I mean, it's all a matter of perspective and where you are coming from. Like, I could easily say that literally any piece of news coming from the US makes me not want to move there no matter how much money you pay me. But at the end of the day, it's just news. It's like that whole panic about London being the most surveiled city in the world with the most cameras per capita in the world - and of course neglecting to mention that most of these cameras are in private hands and police don't have access to them. Get your car or bike stolen in London and discover that no, the police cannot just track them street by street like in James Bond.

      I literally had someone ask me the other day if it's safe to go to London. Like, to visit as a tourist. We've reached some level of absurdity that is almost comedic, but that's what news does to people.

      • LtWorf2 hours ago
        But hold a sign against the king and find out that the police has all the necessary information to find and arrest you :)
        • gambitingan hour ago
          You mean like those few people arrested for disturbing peace during the Queen's funeral/coronation of the King?

          Yeah, that shouldn't have happened and courts have generally agreed that it was a police overreach. But I can assure you that you can go around london protesting the King with whatever banner you want and you won't get arrested - in fact people do daily with no consequences.

          And don't get me wrong - some of the laws around this are insane. But flattening the entire country to focus on one issue is like...not exactly fair? It's like me saying I won't ever move to Sweden because your public sector employees are required to report suspected illegal immigrants(even UK doesn't go that far!).

          The "oh I won't take a job in the UK because someone got arrested protesting the king" is a stance, for sure - I just don't know if any country in the world would meet your high moral standard.