Palantir Held a Hack Week to Add New Controls to Software Used by ICE

Palantir hosted a hack week to address internal concerns about its work with DHS and ICE by creating clearer oversight tools for products used in immigration enforcement. The new tools give organizations more information about how workers use Palantir software. Organizations can set alerts for concerning behavior such as exfiltrating datasets and can search session logs of individual users. The tools also show which users have viewed specific sets of information. Palantir regularly runs hack weeks that bring engineers together to experiment and solve product problems. This hack week focused on building oversight capabilities for platforms like Foundry, Palantir’s data integration and analysis tool.

"The new tools provide organizations, including DHS and ICE, more information on how their workers use Palantir software. Organizations can set up alerts for "concerning behavior," like exfiltrating datasets, and search the session logs of individual users. They also allow organizations to see which users have viewed specific sets of information."

"Palantir regularly holds hack weeks, challenging engineers from across the company to experiment with and solve problems in its products. This hack week focused on Palantir's work with DHS and ICE, which has come under fire from both external critics and workers who fear the company's tools are empowering the Trump administration's immigration crackdown."

""This effort embodies the culture of the Palantir that I choose to work at," Ted Mabrey, head of Palantir's commercial business, wrote in an email to staff in early May. "You have the option to slam cynical emojis in slack channels, distrust your colleagues, and choose to think that narrative-motivated outsiders lying about Palantir's work are more honest than the people showing up to do that work every day. Or you can have the courage to engage and innovate.""

"Bringing together employees from across Palantir, this year's hack week focused on building new tools to provide additional oversight over user behavior on platforms like Foundry, the company's data integration and analysis tool. Palantir declined to comment."

Read at WIRED