A deal between the Government and US data firm Palantir for border checks could give the firm “unprecedented access” to the British public’s data, privacy groups have warned.
The company, which was co-founded by billionaire Peter Thiel and received early investment from the CIA, has been selected by the Cabinet Office to monitor the flow of people and vehicles across the UK border after Brexit.
Palantir’s Foundry system will be able to identify the cause of hold-ups at the border by pulling together information from HMRC, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the Home Office and the Department for Transport.
“Open source and commercially procured data” will also be fed into the system.
The Cabinet Office said the technology will enable government to see information in one place for the first time, enabling faster decision making, but declined to comment on the type of personal data accessible to Palantir.
Matt Mahmoudi, a researcher at Amnesty Tech, called for greater transparency: “It’s important to provide appropriate avenues to scrutinising the ways in which algorithmic systems feature in public life.”
The NHS already uses Palantir to help manage the distribution of medical equipment between UK hospitals, with contract documents showing the company will only have access to personal data that has been either aggregated or "de-identified" to protect people’s privacy.
Mr Mahmoudi said: “The fear is, of course, across these different authorities, that there’s unprecedented access to the British public’s [data], not just their health data, but perhaps also other categories of data from these other authorities that we are unaware of.”
A Government spokesperson said testing has shown Palantir’s technologies were well placed to deliver the border service and the Government had strict measures in place to protect data.
“The procurement of services from Palantir was done transparently and fully in line with well-established Government procurement rules,” they added.
Documents obtained by US website The Intercept found that custom-built software supplied by Palantir to US immigration agencies was able to access information on a person’s schooling, family relationships, employment, phone records, immigration history, personal connections, biometric traits, criminal records as well as home and work addresses.
Privacy International said key contract documents were still missing, including data protection impact assessment statements that outline the risks involved with the technology.
“Unlike the pandemic, Brexit and its impact on trade has been foreseeable for years: there is no reason for any system to be rushed without due regard to transparency and other safeguards that should be the norm across government,” said Edin Omanovic, the organisation’s advocacy director.
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Palantir’s contract, published last month, showed its technology would initially be offered for free, with a one-year extension costing £7.85 million and the second year costing £6.12 million.
Named after the all-seeing crystal ball in Lord of the Rings, Palantir has been hugely successful in using AI to analyse vast amounts of data, pulling patterns and insights that humans might miss. Its software is used by the government agencies, the US military and private companies.
In the firm’s stock market debut in September it was valued at $20 billion.
But to activists, Palantir’s technology is intrusive with the capacity to harness people’s personal data and enable governments to use it against them.
In the US, the company’s software has been linked to digital profiling tools that enabled the Trump administration to deport hundreds of migrants.
Palantir declined to comment, but pointed The Telegraph to a post explaining many of its contracts were private because the organisations it worked with had exceptional confidentiality expectations.
“These organisations define what can and cannot be done with their data,” the blog post said.
According to public contracts, pre-pandemic Palantir had secured contracts with the Ministry of Defence and the Government Digital Services. But the coronavirus created an opportunity for the company to work with new segments of the UK government.
Earlier this month, the Financial Times also reported Palantir was in talks with the government about a new role, managing sensitive contact tracing data.
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