RE: infosec.exchange/@adfichter/11…

@pluralistic #EFF

#EU break ties, break ties, break ties!

But of course, if Palantir does not like the facts, then they sue. Swiss Republik Magazin targeted by #Palantir

sigmoid.social/@adfichter@info…

Adfichter

2026-02-12 11:43:35

The war waged by the tech authoritarian oligarchy against the media has reached a new level:

#Palantir is suing us. Us, the Republik Magazin.

A small Swiss media company, funded by readers, founded in 2018 and free of advertising. I am not aware of any other media company globally that Palantir is currently targeting so aggressively.

What is this about? Together with my wonderful colleagues at the WAV research collective Jenny Steiner, Lorenz Naegeli, Marguerite Meyer, and Balz Oertli, we published a two-part series on Palantir's activities in Switzerland on December 8 and 9.

Using an extensive corpus of documents – which we obtained thanks to the Freedom of Information Act – we were able to trace a sales campaign over a period of seven years. Palantir tried to get in with many federal authorities – and was rejected everywhere.

And we also found out that the Swiss Army Staff evaluated the products and came to the conclusion that the army should refrain from using Palantir products.

Among other risks, they feared that data would be passed on to the US authorities.

Palantir is not just any company. ICE uses its products to hunt down migrants in the US. The Israeli army IDF uses the software in its Gaza offensive. The British health authority NHS has made itself dependent on the products for data analysis during the pandemic. And CEO #AlexKarp displays inhuman and aggressive rhetoric towards Europe, while the company itself advertises the “optimization of the kill chain.”

These are all facts, repeatedly verified and published by renowned media outlets. Our research relating to Switzerland and Zurich is based on this.

In addition to analyzing documents, we also spoke to various sources – including Palantir executives here in Zurich. The quotes used were presented to them and approved. Of course, we always adhered to the high standards of journalistic work. We conducted a thorough fact check before publication.

But the company doesn't want us to write the truth.

After the US company owned by right-wing tech billionaire #PeterThiel dedicated an absurd blog post to us, claiming some misinformation (such as that they had not participated in official tenders with the federal administration, a point we never claimed. On the contrary: we spoke from the outset of attempts to establish contact, sales talks, informal meetings, business as usual), after the Global Director of Privacy & Civil Liberties (PCL) Engineering and contact person for Swiss media Courtney Bowman launched personal attacks against us in LinkedIn comments between Christmas and New Year (“partisan fear-mongering”), Palantir's Swiss lawyers demanded a counterstatement on December 29.

We rejected this demand in its entirety.

In January, they demanded the same thing again. We rejected it again.

And now we see each other in court.

But why all this?

Our research on the Swiss army report caused a huge international media response. The Guardian and the Austrian newspaper Der Standard reported on the Swiss army's rejection. Numerous financial portals and stock market magazines picked up our news (which could have consequences for the overvalued stock market company Palantir).

And Chaos Computer Club spokesperson Constanze Kurz presented our research to a huge audience at the renowned IT conference Chaos Communication Congress in Hamburg at the end of December.

All of this is making Palantir nervous.

We have now submitted a comprehensive defense brief. We can substantiate all of our findings with several documents and publicly available media reports.

We trust in the rule of law and freedom of the press in this country.

In keeping with yesterday's event “Zurich, little Big Tech City” at the Gessneralle, where we first announced this news exclusively to the audience on site:

World politics will soon be negotiated in Zurich: freedom of the press, the facts about ICE, Trump, Israel, Karp, tech authoritarianism.

The truth.

All this at the Zurich Commercial Court.

We will not be intimidated. And we will keep you informed.

The war waged by the tech authoritarian oligarchy against the media has reached a new level:

#Palantir is suing us. Us, the Republik Magazin.

A small Swiss media company, funded by readers, founded in 2018 and free of advertising. I am not aware of any other media company globally that Palantir is currently targeting so aggressively.

What is this about? Together with my wonderful colleagues at the WAV research collective Jenny Steiner, Lorenz Naegeli, Marguerite Meyer, and Balz Oertli, we published a two-part series on Palantir's activities in Switzerland on December 8 and 9.

Using an extensive corpus of documents – which we obtained thanks to the Freedom of Information Act – we were able to trace a sales campaign over a period of seven years. Palantir tried to get in with many federal authorities – and was rejected everywhere.

And we also found out that the Swiss Army Staff evaluated the products and came to the conclusion that the army should refrain from using Palantir products.

Among other risks, they feared that data would be passed on to the US authorities.

Palantir is not just any company. ICE uses its products to hunt down migrants in the US. The Israeli army IDF uses the software in its Gaza offensive. The British health authority NHS has made itself dependent on the products for data analysis during the pandemic. And CEO #AlexKarp displays inhuman and aggressive rhetoric towards Europe, while the company itself advertises the “optimization of the kill chain.”

These are all facts, repeatedly verified and published by renowned media outlets. Our research relating to Switzerland and Zurich is based on this.

In addition to analyzing documents, we also spoke to various sources – including Palantir executives here in Zurich. The quotes used were presented to them and approved. Of course, we always adhered to the high standards of journalistic work. We conducted a thorough fact check before publication.

But the company doesn't want us to write the truth.

After the US company owned by right-wing tech billionaire #PeterThiel dedicated an absurd blog post to us, claiming some misinformation (such as that they had not participated in official tenders with the federal administration, a point we never claimed. On the contrary: we spoke from the outset of attempts to establish contact, sales talks, informal meetings, business as usual), after the Global Director of Privacy & Civil Liberties (PCL) Engineering and contact person for Swiss media Courtney Bowman launched personal attacks against us in LinkedIn comments between Christmas and New Year (“partisan fear-mongering”), Palantir's Swiss lawyers demanded a counterstatement on December 29.

We rejected this demand in its entirety.

In January, they demanded the same thing again. We rejected it again.

And now we see each other in court.

But why all this?

Our research on the Swiss army report caused a huge international media response. The Guardian and the Austrian newspaper Der Standard reported on the Swiss army's rejection. Numerous financial portals and stock market magazines picked up our news (which could have consequences for the overvalued stock market company Palantir).

And Chaos Computer Club spokesperson Constanze Kurz presented our research to a huge audience at the renowned IT conference Chaos Communication Congress in Hamburg at the end of December.

All of this is making Palantir nervous.

We have now submitted a comprehensive defense brief. We can substantiate all of our findings with several documents and publicly available media reports.

We trust in the rule of law and freedom of the press in this country.

In keeping with yesterday's event “Zurich, little Big Tech City” at the Gessneralle, where we first announced this news exclusively to the audience on site:

World politics will soon be negotiated in Zurich: freedom of the press, the facts about ICE, Trump, Israel, Karp, tech authoritarianism.

The truth.

All this at the Zurich Commercial Court.

We will not be intimidated. And we will keep you informed.

"Britain’s reliance on Palantir, the controversial US data surveillance firm, is a “gaping national security vulnerability”, MPs and tech experts have said, as a Nerve investigation reveals how deeply embedded the company is in the UK’s critical national infrastructure.

The Nerve’s investigation shows the company, co-founded by one of President Trump’s most loyal allies, Peter Thiel, is enmeshed in Britain’s civil and defence structures to a far greater degree than previously realised. The Nerve has found at least 34 current and past state contracts across at least 10 government departments, local councils and police authorities.

The investigation also reveals previously undisclosed contracts between Palantir and AWE Nuclear Security Technologies, the agency that underpins Britain’s nuclear deterrence programme.

The agency, formerly known as the Atomic Weapons Establishment, designs and manufactures the nuclear warheads carried by UK submarines. The Nerve has found £15m worth of contracts for “cloud support” on the Crown Commercial Service dashboard, an agency that works with the Cabinet Office and external suppliers.

These contracts are not on the government’s official contract finder website and the Ministry of Defence refused to either confirm or deny their existence. Palantir did not acknowledge or respond to the Nerve’s inquiries.

The Nerve’s research – shown in two infographics here – shows that Palantir has current and historic deals worth £388m with the MOD across at least a dozen contracts and extensions to contracts, and more than £244m with the NHS (12 contracts/extensions). Government agencies and authorities with smaller contracts include Coventry city council, Leicestershire police, DEFRA and the Homes for Ukraine scheme."

thenerve.news/p/palantir-techn…

#UK #Palantir #Surveillance #Thiel #NuclearWeapons

RE: hachyderm.io/@BenjaminHCCarr/1…

Für alle die sich Fragen ob wir es hier nicht etwas mit dem Datenschutz übertreiben.

Die #ICE in den USA nutzt eine App von #Palantir um Leute zum deportieren zu lokalisieren.

Die Daten dafür kommen u.a. aus dem Gesundheitsministerium.

Polizeiliche Überwachung mit #Palantir wurde für BW eingeführt und soll in Deutschland für weitere Bundesländer eingeführt werden.

(Edit/Nachtrag:)
Bericht dazu bei Netzpolitik: netzpolitik.org/2026/us-einwan…

Benjamin Carr, Ph.D. 👨🏻‍💻🧬

2026-01-15 17:16:02

‘ELITE’: The #Palantir App #ICE Uses to Find Neighborhoods to Raid
Palantir is working on a tool for ICE that populates a map with potential #deportation targets, brings up a dossier on each person, and provides a “confidence score” on the person’s current address. ICE is using it to find locations where lots of people it might detain could be. Tool receives peoples’ addresses from Department of Health and Human Services (#HHS) among other sources
404media.co/elite-the-palantir…
archive.ph/9UPzF

‘ELITE’: The Palantir App ICE Uses to Find Neighborhoods to Raid

Internal ICE material and testimony from an official obtained by 404 Media provides the clearest link yet between the technological infrastructure Palantir is building for ICE and the agency’s activities on the ground.

^{Joseph Cox (404 Media)}