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The World Food Programme still won’t talk about the cyber-attack that exposed sensitive data belonging to a vast share of Gaza’s population. But there are new calls for the agency to open up about its controversial partner, the military contractor Palantir.
Inklings explores how aid works in the wilds of humanitarian hubs, on the front lines of emergency response, or in the dark corners of aid punditry.
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Today: The public is talking about Palantir and data (but humanitarians aren’t), and what Pope Leo XIV thinks about data extraction.
Palantir x WFP
Shy of scrutiny but eager to integrate data from across the humanitarian system, the World Food Programme must open up about its secretive relationship with Palantir, a new report warns.
The “Tech for Bad” report spotlights what its authors call “the egregious partnership at the heart of the world’s largest humanitarian supply chain”. WFP started its collab with Palantir in 2019, but has hushed up since then. The big data AI analytics firm, meanwhile, has barrelled into the business of war, supplying governments and militaries with tech that helps them to target and kill (and to surveil and round up migrants using health data).
“WFP’s partnership with Palantir thus constitutes a clear conflict of interest and a grave abdication of ethical responsibility,” states the report, which is written by researcher Tina Indrani Mason and policy analyst Rose Worden.
WFP and Palantir created DOTS, a “data engine” powered by Palantir’s Foundry platform, to optimise its supply chain. DOTS pulls in data from multiple sources – including partners, programmes, supply chains, and data for managing cash-based transfers, according to the report – to produce insights about global operations.
The Tech for Bad report relies mainly on publicly available documents – including evaluations, annual reports, and job postings – to sketch a portrait of a relationship growing increasingly intertwined, and an agency pushing to be the steward of system-wide humanitarian data. A couple bullet points:
- WFP is growing more dependent on Palantir, the authors warn. That’s part of the corporate model: “As more and more otherwise disconnected data sets and ecosystems are integrated into Palantir´s software platform, insights become more sophisticated and clients become more reliant on it,” the authors write. Some of this is hinted at in job ads where Palantir Foundry experience is a prerequisite. The authors also describe “a revolving door” where Palantir staff are embedded within WFP (and, in a few cases, where WFP staff go on to work for Palantir).
- WFP’s dependency will become a system-wide problem. UN reforms could make the humanitarian supply chain even more dependent on WFP, the authors say. The agency will play a lead role in UN-wide plans for supply chain integration, including data sharing, through UN80 and the so-called humanitarian reset.
Does it seem like the vast world outside the humanitarian sector is more self-critical about working with Palantir than humanitarians are?
Techies and privacy experts have long warned of the risks, of course, and it’s hard to forget that thing about being accused of aiding and abetting a genocide. But the humanitarian discourse on Palantir has mostly been muted – concern and internal unease, yes, and quiet policy revisions at other organisations in a few cases, but hardly a public debate.
Compare this to what’s happening elsewhere, where moral arguments mix with a heavier stream of concerns around national sovereignty and avoiding dependency:
- In the United Kingdom, Palantir’s government relations are headline news and fodder for parliamentary debate. The government is reviewing its Palantir contract with the National Health Service. The British Medical Association opposes Palantir’s integration into the NHS. A parliamentary committee cited Palantir as “the most concerning example” of the growing reliance on Big Tech: ”The current position leaves us seriously exposed,” said committee chair Chi Onwurah, a member of parliament. London Mayor Sadiq Khan blocked a £50 million deal between Palantir and the Metropolitan Police. In The Guardian, former politico-turned-tech guy Nick Clegg echoed concerns that Palantir is building dependency in its clients.
- In France, the domestic intelligence agency is dumping Palantir to avoid “strategic dependency” (months after renewing its contract). Dutch police have used Palantir tech for years, but the country’s largest pension fund reportedly decided to cut ties. Denmark is reportedly trying to wean itself off Palantir (“The whole country uses Palantir,” CEO Alex Karp once said). Germany’s military plans to exclude Palantir from contracts. In Switzerland, government agencies and the army have repeatedly said “no” to Palantir (after some consideration, and despite being “tenaciously courted”, as Swiss magazine Republik put it). Last year, Nordic investor Storebrand Asset Management said it would drop Palantir, concerned that the company put it “at risk of violating international humanitarian law”, Reuters reported. Government contracts with Palantir have become fodder for public debate in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and elsewhere.
With governments and some militaries questioning the risks and tradeoffs of partnering with Palantir, it’s telling that there is no equivalent public discourse among humanitarians and aid agencies.
What WFP says: We asked WFP to discuss Palantir, and for comments or clarifications about the Tech for Bad report. They didn’t reply before publication. WFP also has not responded to repeated questions about the Gaza cyber-attack since 3 June. These include questions about the timeline of the data breach and the 17 days that passed before Gazans were notified, the status of any investigations or risk assessments, and the total number of people whose data was exposed.
What faith-based investors think about Palantir: Elon Musk’s SpaceX doesn’t cut it, but Palantir recently passed a “moral audit” by Inspire Investing, a US organisation that describes itself as a leader in “biblically responsible investing”. It’s not exactly unqualified praise: “There is risk with a business like Palantir, for their surveillance technology, and for work that they do to be misused, greatly misused,” CEO Robert Netzly told Business Insider. “A business like that needs to be paid special attention to, but similar to a firearms manufacturer, we don’t hold the manufacturer guilty for customers who may misuse that firearm.”
Pope Leo XIV x WFP |
Pope Leo XIV dropped by WFP’s Rome headquarters on 22 June. In a short speech before the agency’s executive board, the pope touched on the breakdown in multilateralism and the rise of mistrust, and the "bureaucratisation of solidarity” where ”those who do not generate quantifiable value risk becoming invisible”. He described WFP as “a concrete expression of international solidarity”, and threw in a shout-out for Caritas – the church’s aid arm. The pope politely watched a WFP video featuring smiling kids in the Philippines, South Sudan, Peru, and Colombia (only one child was standing in front of a WFP-related sign). Then he had a short meet-n-greet with WFP staff.
- Somewhere in Geneva, someone at the International Organization for Migration is wondering how to engineer a future pontifical visit.
- The pope listened to speeches from both Carl Skau, the acting executive director, and for some reason, Cindy McCain, who had already stepped down as WFP boss. Then Skau and McCain flanked the pope as he signed the WFP guestbook in this totally natural photo.
What Pope Leo XIV didn’t mention: His views on data. The pope’s May encyclical on artificial intelligence pushed to “disarm” AI to safeguard humanity. In it, he also described data extraction as a new form of colonialism:
- “Entire regions, especially those marked by structural fragility and limited geopolitical relevance, are currently subjected to a new mindset of extraction: that of health data, epidemiological profiles, genetic maps, and demographic information. These have become the new ‘rare earths’ of power: vital data which, once aggregated and analysed, can be used to train predictive models, guide investment strategies, anticipate crises and, above all, determine who and what is deemed to matter. Those who control the health data of entire peoples – often collected under the pretext of aid, research or innovation – possess a structural leverage over the future, for they can shape needs and markets. They can also decide, before others, to whom medicines, investments, and protections will be allocated. Here lies one of the most urgent moral challenges of our time: to ensure that shared knowledge becomes a true common good rather than an instrument of dominance. This requires restoring to individuals not only the data that describes them, but also the ability to decide how it is used, by whom, and for whose benefit.”
End quote |
“I received rice, beans, oil, and salt. I say thank you to WFP.”
Loop, the aid feedback startup, is closing down (apparently for good this time).
“The current environment has made it financially impossible to continue delivering this collective service,” the organisation said in a post on the people’s hot take app, Linkedin.
Loop was created to be an independent channel to help people communicate with aid providers, but faced pushback from some aid agencies.
“Individual organisations are so worried about Loop having data,” Loop founder Alex Ross told us in 2024. “We’ll hear things like, ‘Why do you have information about my beneficiaries? Who gave you the right?’ And this indicates a real fear about what's happening to data about your organisation, and how can they manage that in a way that protects their brand and their funding.”
Unusually for the humanitarian sector, Loop also publicly posts some of the feedback sent through the app (stripped of sensitive details). The stream of messages (many requests for assistance) tells stories of drought, lost jobs, conflict, and growing hardship – most with a polite frankness.
Occasionally, messages are heartfelt thanks to humanitarians.
“I received rice, beans, oil, and salt. I say thank you to WFP,” reads a recent note from North Kivu, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. “But after this month, what will we do? We cannot go back to the fields because the fighting continues. Let the help become regular. Every month until peace returns. We don’t just want to survive today, we also want to live tomorrow.”
Or another from Ituri, the epicentre of the ongoing Ebola outbreak: “We saw the planes arrive. They unloaded tons of medical equipment. Finally, our caregivers will no longer work without protection. Finally, our patients will have enough to take care of themselves. I am relieved. I thank those who sent this help. Now we can fight Ebola with the right weapons.”
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