Dear Chief Executive Team,
We the undersigned NHS employees from across Bristol and South Gloucestershire note that BNSSG, NBT and UHBW are signed up to the NHS FDP and have not adopted it yet. We urge you to reject adoption of the Federated Data Platform operated by Palantir for ethical reasons.
Palantir is a US tech company which specialises in AI-powered military and surveillance technology and data analytics. Palantir describes its military technologies as offering customers “mission-tested capabilities, forged in the field” to deliver “a tactical edge – by land, air, sea and space”.
Palantir has a long history of using its technology to facilitate human rights abuses across the world.
Palantir is currently supplying the Israeli military with “advanced technology provision” in support of war related missions. Palantir’s CEO Alex Karp is “exceedingly proud” of Palantir’s involvement in what he calls “operationally crucial operations in Israel” keeping Israel “armed and ahead”.
The most recent International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling regarding Palestine came in July 2024, with an Advisory Opinion that declared Israel’s occupation of Palestine unlawful under international law, specifically mentioning forcible transfer, racial discrimination and apartheid, and it called for Israel to withdraw immediately. The ICJ also laid out directions for the responsibility of states and international organisations and stated that failing to act was furthering ‘genocidal violence’. By supplying advanced AI technology to the Israeli military, it is likely that Palantir is complicit in war crimes and genocidal violence.
Additional Records of Harm and unethical practice involving Palantir:
Immigration and Policing Enforcement:
- Palantir’s software (FALCON) was used by the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to track and deport migrants, including family separatio
- Palantir provides predictive policing services to the US police force, shown to disproportionately target Black communities.
- NHS conflict: ICE’s actions violate medical ethics (e.g., deterring migrants from healthcare).
Covid-19 contracts:
In March 2020, as the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic exploded, Dominic Cummings and Simon Stevens (then NHS CEO) called a meeting on how to tackle Covid-19 with several big tech companies, including Palantir. The next day a deal to use Palantir’s software to create a Covid-19 database for just £1 for the first three months was signed. This contract was given without competitive tender. Matt Hancock used special ministerial powers to bypass patient confidentiality rules and allow the company to process patient data.
This underscores Palantir’s long-held pecuniary interest in patient data and wilful ignorance of patient confidentiality, neither of which are consistent with appropriate use of our patient and patients’ data.
Military Contracts:
1. In addition to the AI targeting systems supplied to the Israeli military, used in Gaza bombardments of hospitals and killing of healthcare workers and civilians, Palantir provides/ provided:
2. US military services for wartime operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, in particular drone strikes, which are known to have targeted civilians.
3. NHS association with a company linked to civilian harm undermines public trust and will cause great reputational risk.
(Please see citations below).
Given the evidence above, you will agree that Palantir is an unacceptable partner for the BNSSG, NBT and UHBW and NHS England, and rolling out its technology in the FDP will undermine our commitments to securing patient trust.
The city of Bristol has shown strong support over the last 19 months for ending the war on innocent people with weekly demonstrations against genocide. Our Bristol MPs, Carla Denyer and Kerry McCarthy have informed multiple constituents on multiple occasions via email of their dismay at the human rights abuses perpetrated by Israel. There has been widespread condemnation by international organisations such as the UN and Amnesty International at the targeted attacks on health and aid institutions.
The adoption of the FDP run by Palantir’s Foundry software will also compromise our commitments as health workers to protecting, promoting and maintaining the health, safety and wellbeing of the public, and promoting and maintaining public confidence in the medical and healthcare professions.
NHS data is one of the most valuable datasets in the world and does not belong in the hands of private corporations.
Effective management and use of health data is vitally important, but it should be done solely to benefit present and future patients, not to line the pockets of profit-making corporations, particularly those that also operate within the global war machinery.
Public trust is integral to the functioning of any public health system. Data safety and patient buy-in is vital. To get the best out of the data platform, patients need to give consent to their data being used in this way. The NHS is a trusted institution and patients are much more likely to consent where the data stays within a publicly trusted institution.
The concerns that have been raised for years by patients, doctors, politicians and campaigners about a Palantir-run Federated Data Platform have still not been adequately addressed, and patients have not been given a meaningful say in the decision-making process. Polling from YouGov, commissioned by the Doctors Association indicated that 48% of adults would opt out of data sharing if the Federated Data Platform was introduced and run by a private company. Health professionals are presenting motions at union level to call for a review of Palantir in the NHS, most notably with recent motions submitted at Unison Regional Council level (May 2025) and at the BMA Annual Representative Meeting (June 2025).
It is not too late for Trusts to refuse to implement adopt the FDP and its products. There are several trusts that have declared they have “no plans to join” such as the Christie NHSFT, St Georges’ University Hospitals NHSFT and Devon Partnership NHSFT.
Our requests to the BNSSG, NBT and UHBW are as follows:
● Do not implement the FDP locally and/or pause any existing rollout plans
● Raise these concerns nationally and oppose the mandated rollout on all Trusts
● Publicly, clearly and widely communicate BNSSG, NBT and UHBW ‘s position on the FDP driven by Palantir and its Foundry software
● Explain whether – and how – patients can opt out of including their data in the FDP
Signed by names below
Citations and links:
https://www.bmj.com/content/386/bmj.q1712
https://www.bmj.com/content/380/bmj.p607
https://corporatewatch.org/palantir-international-tech-despot/
https://shado-mag.com/articles/act/how-is-your-health-data-linked-to-israeli-occupation/#:~:text=The%20health%20of%20Palestinians%20has,psychological%20torture%20of%20Palestinian%20prisoners
https://corporatewatch.org/palantir-in-the-uk/
https://privacyinternational.org/report/4271/all-roads-lead-palantir
https://www.middleeasteye.net/live-blog/live-blog-update/military-tech-firm-backing-war-gaza-awarded-nhs-data-contract-worth
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestine-war-palantir-military-tech-firm-backing-war-gaza-awarded-uk-nhs-data-contract
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/palantir-peter-thiel-nhs-england-foundry-faster-data-flows/
https://goodlawproject.org/tory-minister-takes-5000-donation-from-palantirs-uk-boss/#:~:text=We%20can%20reveal%20that%20Louis,to%20the%20latest%20Parliamentary%20records.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/b7prPlpNOi4
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/0mhNLTy5pbQ
https://www.amnestyusa.org/press-releases/palantirs-contracts-with-ice-raise-human-rights-concerns-around-direct-listing/
·https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/ofccp/ofccp20160926
https://www.wgbh.org/news/2025-05-05/former-palantir-workers-condemn-companys-work-with-trump-administration
Palantir — who successfully sued the Army — has won a major Army contract
https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/latest-news/palantir-claims-applying-generative-ai-to-warfare-is-ethical-without-addressing-problems-of-llms/