Overview
- Scotland Yard said over the weekend that a Palantir-built tool pooling data the Met already holds triggered hundreds of internal investigations and led to three arrests for suspected offences including sexual assault, rape and misconduct in public office.
- The review uncovered misuse of internal systems such as false overtime claims, shift data manipulation and misrepresented home working, with 98 officers probed over rostering abuse, about 42 senior officers assessed for hybrid-working breaches and 12 facing cases over undeclared Freemasonry.
- The Metropolitan Police Federation on Monday condemned the deployment as intrusive, said it is considering legal action under data protection and human-rights law, and advised officers to be cautious about carrying work phones off duty due to alleged 24/7 location tracking.
- Sadiq Khan’s office said Monday it had no role in the current Palantir work because it fell below the £500,000 scrutiny threshold, and it signaled he may try to block any future Met contracts above that level.
- The controversy intensifies scrutiny of Palantir, a US data firm co-founded by Peter Thiel that already holds major UK public-sector deals with the NHS and Ministry of Defence, a footprint that has drawn calls from MPs for tougher oversight.