Concerns have been raised regarding NHS England’s March 2024 plan to roll out a new platform for sharing patient data, due to the platform’s connections to the US tech firm Palantir.

The NHS Federated Data Platform (NHS FDP), is being rolled out across Cambridgeshire after being adopted by Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (CUH).

This is in spite of growing concerns surrounding the capacity for the software to abuse access to sensitive information and the involvement of its software provider, Palantir, in the ongoing Israel-Gaza conflict.

The first part of the NHS FDP to be adopted for the Cambridge Trust is Optica, which the CUH say will be in use by the end of the year.

Optica aims to bring care teams together to ensure patients have the equipment, medication, and support they require outside hospital. To achieve this, the FDP accesses personal data. Until now, this data has only been used by the NHS.

Other concerns center around Palantir itself. The US tech firm, initially funded by the CIA in 2003, specialises in AI-powered military and surveillance technology.

It provides military technologies to the US military, ICE (the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency), the UK Ministry of Defence, and the Israeli government.

Worries stem from concerns that there are not sufficient assurances that Palantir will not use NHS data for other purposes, and that this data could become available to the police or military.

Palantir special advisor, Stephen Childs, said that “Where FDP has already been deployed, it’s reducing the longest unnecessary hospital stays by an average of 17.2 per cent.”

Meanwhile, CEO, Alex Karp, defended the company by declaring it “does not buy, sell or transfer the data it handles and that the data ultimately belongs to the government client”.

Freedom of Information enquiries by Corporate Watch, along with accounts gathered from health workers by No Palantir in the NHS, suggest that “many local NHS trusts and bodies are refusing to comply with the rollout of the FDP, describing Palantir’s technology as a step backwards on existing systems”.

The report, published in August, alleges: “Only 34 trusts (just under 15 per cent) were actively using the platform and its products.” Some trusts have declined the offer to introduce the NHS FDP due to technical challenges.

Healthcare workers have also voiced concern surrounding the suitability of Palantir as an NHS partner.

The company have responded that “these claims assert that Palantir is the (or a) developer of the ‘Gospel’ – the AI-assisted targeting software allegedly used by the IDF in Gaza, and that we are involved with the ‘Lavender’ database used by the IDF for targeting cross-referencing”.

“These statements are not true. Both capabilities are independent of and pre-date Palantir’s announced partnership with the Israeli Defense Ministry. Additionally, we have no involvement with the Lavender database used by the IDF for targeting identification.”

“We have no relationship to these programs and their use, but are proud to support Israeli defense and national security missions in other programs and contexts”.