Emails link Palantir and Eric Schmidt's daughter to Cambridge Analytica

https://www.businessinsider.com/emails-peter-thiel-palantir-facebook-cambridge-analytica-2018-3

by SirLJ • 8 years ago

63 5 8 years ago

thotaway• 8 years ago

Whenever anyone tells you that Facebook and Palantir have nothing to do with each other, remember that when Facebook vacated its original headquarters on University Ave, Palantir moved in.

And Peter Thiel indirectly funded Cambridge Analytica through a PAC. And he is STILL on the board of Facebook! Today!

useryournoggin• 8 years ago

someone working for palantir in a business development role did some business development. why is this a news story?

IAmEveryone• 8 years ago

I'm feeling uneasy about this particular strand of this scandal...

She was a 23 year old intern, and had already left Cambridge Analytica when she send that email in 2013. The comment on the forwarded message within CA was "Ever come across Palantir?" If employees at CA did not even know the company, how was she supposed to see them as the shadowy big brother company that is their image today?

The timeline is also important: First, she left CA. She then send that email in summer 2013. Only some time after that did CA start its program to syphon Facebook's data.

It seems perfectly plausible that she had just completed a completely benign internship at a company that presented itself as a sort of next-gen online advertisement agency with a bend towards academic psychology.

There is also no indication that her father is involved, nor are there any plausible reasons to believe that he would have any interest in the sort of seedy activity that later transpired.

The connection to Eric Schmidt seems little more than a curious coincidence. And while there are obviously many people worse off in life than her, this attention doesn't seem entirely warranted and possibly quite unnerving.

wu-ikkyu• 8 years ago

It seems these big tech companies have become de facto arms dealers. After all, their munitions ("big data") are being loaded into weaponized algorithms designed by military contractors and deployed against civilian populations.

What an ingenious racket it is to have your target produce the munitions that you then turn around and use against them.

nugi• 8 years ago

This is the silent deadly undercurrent running unacknowledged through tech. All tech is eventually weaponized, no matter how noble or benign the originating concept seemed.

Emails link Palantir and Eric Schmidt's daughter to Cambridge Analytica

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