Whatever is said about Tom Watson, the former deputy leader of the Labour party has a knack for landing headlines. In the past he did it at the expense of the rich and powerful – from News International, over phone hacking, to the Home Office, over its mass surveillance of our data. But his latest headline – that he has joined Palantir as a senior vice-president – has been at the expense of public confidence in the political class.
His new appointment is more than just a private career choice. It sends yet another signal to a weary public about just how far the rot in our democracy has spread. Now, the former scourge of mass surveillance finds a surveillance company “the most interesting … on the planet”.
It’s quite a journey, and one not many of us will want to take with him. Palantir does do work of real consequence. Watson says some criticism of Palantir is propaganda.
Some of it is also true, which is the part he will find harder to square. Palantir is a company built on surveillance and military targeting. Its co-founder Peter Thiel wrote in 2009 that he no longer believed freedom and democracy were compatible.
He sees technology as an alternative to politics, a way to change the world without having to persuade voters, and backs private “startup cities” run by chief executives. This attitude runs through the company’s DNA. Palantir’s co-founder and chief executive, Alex Karp, has boasted that its work is there “to scare enemies and on occasion kill them”.
Its software is used to target people for ICE raids in the US, and civilians in Gaza. This isn’t just another global corporation with some unsavoury corners to its business. I can’t parse Watson’s mind or motivation.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
