Uncanny Valley | WIRED

Palantir: The Most Mysterious Company in Silicon Valley

14 Aug 2025

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Palantir Technologies is arguably one of the most notorious American corporations. Cofounded by tech billionaire Peter Thiel, the company has worked with ICE, the US Department of Defense, the Israeli military and sparked numerous protests in multiple countries. But what do they actually do? Palantir is often called a data broker, a data miner, or a giant database of personal information. In reality, it’s none of these—but even former employees struggle to explain it. Luckily, WIRED staff writer Caroline Haskins joins us to decode Palantir for us. Join us LIVE in San Francisco on September 9th Get your tickets HERE Articles mentioned in this episode: What Does Palantir Actually Do? Palantir Is Helping DOGE With a Massive IRS Data Project ICE Is Paying Palantir $30 Million to Build ‘ImmigrationOS’ Surveillance Platform Lauren’s latest article: Lisa Su Runs AMD - and Is Out for Nvidia’s Blood Join WIRED’s best and brightest on Uncanny Valley as they dissect the collision of tech, politics, finance, and business, from Alexis Ohanian's newest tech venture to the effects of inaccurate information from artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots on social protests. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

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Palantir: The Most Mysterious Company in Silicon Valley

This episode hasn't been transcribed yet

Other episodes from Uncanny Valley | WIRED

Meta's AI Workers Are Revolting; Peter Thiel's Secret Society; Will Trump Free SBF?

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Why Anthropic Shut Down Its Best AI (Special News Update)

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