The spy tech firm managing NHS data – podcast

Palantir, the US spy-tech firm co-founded by the billionaire Peter Thiel, has won a contract to handle NHS data. It's a deal that has left privacy advocates such as Cori Crider with serious questions

The NHS does not have a happy history with big IT projects. In the past, hugely ambitious schemes have run aground, costing taxpayers billions of pounds. But its systems for managing the vast amounts of data generated on a daily basis are creaking. In some cases it can be easier for patients to physically transport their own paper documents between NHS providers than to rely on the health service's computer systems.

That is the backdrop for the recent NHS announcement that a deal has been done with the US spy-tech company Palantir to manage data in its hospitals, connecting up information held by different trusts and allowing the health service to draw conclusions about population health.