Surveillance and data-manipulation giant Palantir was a CIA-funded creation and has become one of the planet's most powerfully evil companies.

[su_liam@mas.to]

@dangillmor Peter Thiel isn’t the sort of human being* you want in a position of power or authority over other people.

[gimulnautti@mastodon.green]

@dangillmor Great write-up!

I would just like to add how classic conservative all this ”libertarian authoritarianism” is.

Greedy people who want nothing but power, when out of power they’re all for liberalism and small government. But when they are in power, they’re all about big government and anti-liberalism.

The people haven’t changed and their greed for power hasn’t changed.

[fenixmaster@mastodon.social]

@dangillmor You know, I know but our politicians do not know.

[fazalmajid@social.vivaldi.net]

@dangillmor Evil was always the plan, not something they stumbled into. The name itself is a clear signal.

[phl@mastodon.social]

@dangillmor Sadly it's not the general public that chooses to embed Palantir into everything.

[ferricoxide@blahaj.zone]

@gulfie@mastodonapp.uk

Heh... The "flying people out" reminds me of interviewing with Amazon.

The position was local to me, but, since they were expanding a practice that was previously Seattle-only, they needed to fly me out to be interviewed. Day before I was due to fly out — which is to say, tickets were already procured, my PTO was already arranged, etc., the Amazon HR person asked what kind of compensation I was looking for. Seemed an odd question:

1) I'd already told them at the beginning of the process (I generally don't like wasting time on interviewing for jobs I can't afford to take if offered).

2) One would think you'd (re)ask that question before money had been committed to flights and PTO had been arranged

At any rate, I reminded her the range I'd previously said I'd need. She got quiet, then said, "that's more than we're looking to pay for this position". I responded, "Ok, so, do you still want me to fly out? I'm already out the PTO, regardless. Dunno whether y'all are out the ticket price or not". She said to go ahead and fly out. As expected, it was a wasted trip — not just the compensation thing but, being a new position, the people interviewing me didn't know how to interview for the newly-created position.

At any rate, a couple year's later, a different person reached out to me about the same position. They were up front about the pay-rang and it had increased markedly — to a point where it was actually competitive for the hiring-region (guessing they discovered that requisite expertise in my region was more expensive than when they initially opened the position).

So, while not so much "sketchy", it was definitely a "wtf were you thinking" kind of deal.

[sysadmin1138@ngmx.com]

@ferricoxide @dangillmor I ALSO applied there in late 2013, before I knew anything about them.

During the interview process, they said they'd like me to work in their SCIF. That's when I had my WTF moment. Secure Compartmentalized Information Facilities are where you keep the Cthulhonic horrors. I don't want to work with Cthulhonic horrors, thank you. I bounced.

[ferricoxide@blahaj.zone]

@sysadmin1138@ngmx.com @dangillmor@mastodon.social

Yeah. Part of the salary "problem" was they wanted cleared personnel but they neither wanted to pay for people that already had the necessary clearances nor did they want to pay for people to maintain the kind of lifestyle-restrictions that allow one to get and retain those clearances.

"Horrors" aside, the lifestyle-restrictions can be onerous (depending on the agency one needs to work for). DoJ, for example, has long had problems hiring people because they have a lifetime proscription against use of recreational drugs. I've worked in IT for a long time and a lifetime history clean of recreational drug use seems to be rare among IT types, particularly the more-gifted ones. So, I've had professional acquaintances get turned down in their thirties for having been pot-smokers in highschool or college. I can only imagine that, as more states loosen rules around such consumption, DoJ's either going to have to rethink that or be satisfied pulling from an ever-shrinking pool of candidates. Most other agencies acquaintances have told me about seem to take a more pragmatic approach. Something akin to, "as long as you disclose the history prior to your background investigation and refrain from further use during the period you have a clearance, we can waive that history".

[swggrkllr3rd@mastodon.world]

@dangillmor After WW2 cia hooked w. nazis to fight the reds. It can be hard to separate the two.

[tomtom@pouet.chapril.org]

@phl @dangillmor yes indeed and all the nefarious actions of Palantir didn't make them blacklisted at all:

Client Challenge

(www.lemonde.fr)

MPs question UK Palantir contracts after investigation reveals security concerns

Journalists find Swiss government rejected company over fears US intelligence might gain access to sensitive data

the Guardian (www.theguardian.com)

Only the swiss resisted

Just a moment...

(www.republik.ch)

[subm3rge@infosec.exchange]

@dangillmor