Sankar: We have no data.

Douthat: But you’re not devising systems to acquire new forms of data for the government, right?

Sankar: Correct.

Douthat: But you are creating systems where the government has access to data — and I think this is important — on a scale that no government has ever had access to before. Like, one of the unique features of 21st-century digital age America is that it’s just so much easier to track and observe people in all kinds of different ways. Corporate America does that even more than the government does.

Sankar: I think so.

Sankar: There’s two thoughts there. One is: Well, are you saying that you feel safer because the institutions that are supposed to protect you are structurally incompetent?

And that’s the part where I feel like —

Douthat: The answer might be: Yes, sometimes — right?

Sankar: Yeah. And then a consequence of that — which I think a democracy can decide — is that they also can’t do their job. They can’t protect you from the things that they’re supposed to protect you from.

So I’d offer another solution to this, which is: They should be really good at doing what they’re doing, and we should have a strong ability to oversee that they’re not doing things that they’re not supposed to be doing.

That’s exactly what we designed Palantir to do.

Sankar: So you have to both help the people who are protecting us, and you have to empower the people who are watching the watchers so that they also have asymmetrically strong technology to ensure that there are no abuses.

Douthat: So who is watching the watchers? We can stick with immigration enforcement: Presumably there’s data and information that is protected by privacy that ICE is not supposed to be accessing, right?

Sankar: So the first line of defense is on the front end, like: Do you even have authority to have this data?

The lawyers on the front end have data use agreements that they have with their own interagency data use agreements and the authorities that collected the data to begin with.

And then the second line of defense, after they have the data, is: Are you using it for permitted use?

And that’s usually, I don’t know, for every agency this is — look, I’m a builder, so consult a policy person — but something like the Office of the Inspector General or other law enforcement agencies that are responsible for this. Sometimes, depending on the context, it can actually be counterintelligence.

It’s the same infrastructure that you would use to make sure that people aren’t abusing the data. It’s how you would also make sure that you don’t have a spy in your organization.

Douthat: In the end, though, it is up to the people running those institutions to decide whether to basically track abuses at all.

Sankar: That’s right.

Sankar: I mean, yeah. I think that’s a little bit of a nihilistic view. There’s statutory requirements on this. I understand the perspective, but I don’t agree with it — of, hey, we can’t trust these institutions at all.

There are rules — they follow the rules. They’re also humans. They’re not infallible. But I don’t think people are willy-nilly deciding whether they want to do this or not.

Douthat: There is a way in which you, independent of what you think about Trump himself, when Palantir goes to work for a government — U.S. government, any other government — are putting yourself in the position of trusting that government with this very impressive technology that you’ve built.

Sankar: Yeah. I think that’s right. You have to pick your customers.

Douthat: But if the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia called you up and said: we just want to build a digital ID system — you would be less likely to do that work because they’re not a democratic government? Would that be fair?

Sankar: I would leave that up to Alex [Karp] to figure out. It depends on their uses.

I’m not sure that’s exactly fair. I mean, is it leading to a more efficient electronic government? What’s the purpose of it? That’s the question. There’s a difference of, which agency’s doing it? And what is their mandate? What data do they have? What are the work flows they’re trying to enable?

Douthat: But from the beginning — again, in the name, from “Lord of the Rings” — you have this idea that you’re building a technology that, in the story the name originates from, is used for good and for evil. I’m just interested in the extent to which that judgment is, more than most companies, woven into the kind of governmental work you’re willing to do.

Sankar: It’s very woven into it. I mean, we pick our partners very carefully. We want to work on work that’s important to the West