[Readers are encouraged to open the embedded links for proper references and a better understanding.]
When J.R.R. Tolkien described ‘Palantír’ in his book, Lord of the Rings, in 1954, even after knowing what George Orwell wrote 5 years back, he had zero idea of what human civilization would achieve in the next 50 years or so.For me, Orwell’s ‘1984’ is nothing less than the gospel of Technical-trends in 2026 — uncovering all the ways the Governments all around the world spy (and will spy) on their citizens. The so-called ‘telescreens’ as described in the book are nothing but our cell-phones of today — having a microphone, camera and a geo-tracker, all conveniently placed for any Government & their 3-letter agency to track you. It sends a chill down my spine when I think too much about it.
Apologies in advance, if my tone sounds somber but, such is the topic. In 2026, privacy is a myth. Today, laws are nothing but a façade, made to keep you under the control of the powers that be. So much so, that if a C-suite Executive, comfortably sitting somewhere in the NASDAQ Top 50, decides that he needs to sell more of your data to advertisers and data-brokers, well guess what? You don’t have a choice. All you get is an email stating the above change in their Terms and Conditions, followed by a barrage of spam calls, emails & texts. Anyways, shifting back to the topic of ‘surveillance’. What happens when one company acts as the backbone of all the tracking and mapping that can be done to the citizens of a country?
Enter ‘Palantir Technologies’. Founded in 2003, following the aftermath of 9/11, Palantir was formed to ‘prevent’ it from happening again.
23 years later, they play an important role in all the US Defence sectors, not to mention tightly integrated in Military and other enforcement agencies (looking at you, ICE). I don’t want to make this a hate-piece about Palantir but who else is the villain here? Their tools like ‘Immigration-OS’, ‘Foundry’ and ‘Gotham’ are nothing but digital weapons.
The currency, I’m sorry, the ammunition is the data. Their software is the weapon. You can guess who the target is.
Allegedly, this has been going on since the Iraq war. Now imagine, software designed for war, trained on one of the best militaries in the world, on one of the most sensitive military conflicts of our history. Can we still act nescient to what they’re doing? Or do I need to mention that Oracle and Nvidia joined forces with Palantir? Few more ‘buddies’ include Accenture, AWS, among many others.
But why am I mentioning this? It does not concern us right? We’re not in the US of A? Well, our Indian government has NATGRID. And it can track you (and people connected to you) by just your UPI payments. Scary, I know. Worst of all, they recently embedded NPR (National Population Register) to make an interconnected web of all the transactions being done by any individual. This is just the beginning.
But what can you do? Realistically, nothing. You can’t stop using UPI because our government has made cash very irrelevant. On purpose or just by accident? I’ll let you decide.
In today’s age, especially here in India after the 2016’s ‘Free Internet’ situation (courtesy of Reliance-Jio), most of you already have some form of social media profile and the habit of posting on the internet somewhat frequently. If not that, then you have all other apps like Uber, Zomato, also tracking you and your habits, on top of what Google and Apple already do. Hell, even Windows 11 has a lot of telemetry built in (and it’s getting worse with every update – thanks Microsoft).
We’re locked to this system. Even if we wanted to, we can’t properly delete our digital persona. Even if we did that, life will be very tough, don’t you think? It’s not the 80s anymore. “Everything is connected”. It’s funny when a video game showed us a glimpse of this 13 years ago. I won’t be surprised if Palantir develops a central-operating system, embedded with AI (the hot new buzzword of course), to profile you on-the-go, for law enforcements to track you before you even move, for banks to cancel your loan application even before you click on it, and for companies to reject your job application before you get the chance to click on the apply button. Scary isn’t it? What would really scare you, is if Reliance-Jio decides to partner with Palantir to bring that software system to our very own country. Because let’s be honest, you know it will happen.
Like I said, privacy is a myth. You can only stay off the grid for so long. We all have jobs to do, forms to fill, bank accounts to access. How far will you run? No matter where you go, and just like Orwell said – ‘Big brother is watching’.
Some awareness in this matter is all I request from you, my dear reader. Your due-dilligence, & being vigilant will go a long way. Your eyes need to be wide open to see the truth, your ears open to differentiate the lies, and a fully awake mind, hopefully, to adapt to the truth. Because you sure as hell cannot fight the mis-information. This is just the beginning.
My ideal solution, if you were to ask me, would be to magically make you all more ‘Cyber-aware’ and equip you to fight for what you really own – your data. Maybe try ditching Windows for a start ? Little things count. What apps you uninstall, what services you block, they all matter.
But always remember, things get worse before they get better. The burning desire of privacy and freedom is the only thing that can keep you alive and pushing forward in today’s digital age. Our human genome has always led us to fight and rebel when it was all ‘too much’. Why stop now? Why are we docile now? What is stopping us? Are we limiting ourselves? Are we really that scared? Can we give up like this? Without a fight? I guess you know what my answer would be.
I guess I have rambled enough. I want you all to sit and think, just for once, is it worth fighting for?
Irrespective of the answer, I would like to end with this beautiful quote from a recent TV show – “….the death of truth is the ultimate victory of evil. When truth leaves us, when we let it slip away, when it is ripped from our hands, we become vulnerable to the appetite of whatever monster screams the loudest.”
Fight back. Take control.
