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).
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...
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.
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?
TBF, if an evil SPECTRE-level corporation with global tentacles and Tolkien-inspired omniscience can't manage to quash some bad PR on Hacker News, none of its prospective customers would take it seriously.
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.
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.
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.
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?
>“We recognise that the DPIA contained an error in how it described supplier access to data so we are correcting that error, and we apologise for any confusion this has caused,” the NHS said.
They're not sorry that Palantir has the data, they're sorry you found out Palantir has the data. Don't worry though, 'unequivical guidance' has been issued by a committee.
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.
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.
I mean, only someone who knows literally nothing about either the UK or NK would think that, but I guess on the internet you are free to think anything you want.
>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.
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.
Sternly? Hey hey hey, let's not go overboard here.
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).
Insert "this is fine" meme
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...
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-...
Palantir: The Japanese Knot Weed of technology.
Wow this was moved fast off the frontpage! Now on page 3 after 50min. Just FYI.
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?
TBF, if an evil SPECTRE-level corporation with global tentacles and Tolkien-inspired omniscience can't manage to quash some bad PR on Hacker News, none of its prospective customers would take it seriously.
Yeah, I caught it on the refresh! Makes one wonder what the impetus was for the change...
And this comment is being downvoted as well to hide the fact.
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.
> 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...
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.
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.
Oh well, at least they apologised.
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?
>“We recognise that the DPIA contained an error in how it described supplier access to data so we are correcting that error, and we apologise for any confusion this has caused,” the NHS said.
They're not sorry that Palantir has the data, they're sorry you found out Palantir has the data. Don't worry though, 'unequivical guidance' has been issued by a committee.
Nothing happens, is what happens.
Now the deed is done, one cannot undo it.
"Whoops sorrgy! Your honor, I plead silly :3c"
This is insanely fucked up, but also unsurprising.
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.
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.
At least you don't get arrested for protesting in the streets in sweden, unlike UK…
Keep moving those goal posts!
https://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/a/zAvve4/palestinademonst...
Getting arrested because you protested about the wrong subject in the wrong place and didn't disperse because of not having the right licence?
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.
But hold a sign against the king and find out that the police has all the necessary information to find and arrest you :)
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.
> You mean like those few people arrested for disturbing peace during the Queen's funeral/coronation of the King?
I mean like those who asked for the permit to hold a protest, got the permit and then got arrested anyway… You'd think it was NK and instead…
Not heard of that one.
>>You'd think it was NK
I mean, only someone who knows literally nothing about either the UK or NK would think that, but I guess on the internet you are free to think anything you want.