Palantir Held Another ‘Hack Week.’ This Time, the Focus Was ICE
Quick Look
- Palantir's 'Hack Week' focused on user-auditing tools for ICE, amid employee concerns about the company's relationship with the agency.
- Meanwhile, Meta faces record profits alongside low morale and impending layoffs, with employees scrambling to use benefits.
AI-generated summary
Why It Matters
This collection of articles highlights growing tensions and controversies surrounding major tech companies like Palantir and Meta, as well as governmental actions related to immigration and technology. Employee unrest, ethical concerns over data usage and surveillance, and the societal impact of AI are recurring themes.
Palantir Held Another ‘Hack Week.’ This Time, the Focus Was ICE The hackathon, held to build user-auditing tools for Palantir customers, comes as the company struggles to address employee concerns over its relationship with ICE.
Meta’s New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale Next week, Meta is cutting about 10 percent of its staff. WIRED spoke with more than a dozen current and former employees about what it's like inside a company where “everyone is unhappy.”
Meta Employees Are Scrambling to Use Up Benefits Ahead of Layoffs On the eve of about 8,000 jobs being cut, employees are cashing in on headphone stipends and other perks while they still can.
The State Department Really Doesn’t Want to Talk About the Office of Remigration The office was created a year ago and seemingly named for a far right European plan to expel minorities and immigrants from Western nations. It now works, a source says, with little to no oversight.
An Engineer’s Post Protesting Laptop Surveillance Is Going Viral Inside Meta Meta employees in the US and UK are organizing against corporate software that tracks workers’ keystrokes and mouse activity.
‘We’re Just Getting the Crumbs Here’: Contractors Protest Layoffs at Meta’s European Headquarters Soon-to-be-laid-off Meta contractors say they’re being treated differently than Mark Zuckerberg’s full-time employees, who stand to receive more generous severance packages.
Cybercrime Crew Claims It Hacked Mike Lindell’s MyPillow Plus: A ransomware group is now stealing data in person, BusPatrol wants to hand its license plate surveillance data to the cops, and more.
US Law Enforcement Warns of ‘Anti-Tech Extremism’ as AI Hatred Grows As Americans stew over the looming risk of job-stealing AI and data centers in their back yards, the feds are raising the alarm about a new category of threat, documents obtained by WIRED show.
Norse Atlantic Airways Offers Dirt-Cheap Tickets. There’s a Catch Dozens of people have complained to the Federal Trade Commission about Norse Atlantic Airways’ tech-first customer service operation. Some said they lost thousands of dollars.
The White House’s Aliens.gov Site Brags That ICE Arrested More Than 700 US Citizens The website, which compares human beings to extraterrestrials, touts arrest numbers from the Trump administration’s sweeping immigration crackdown. But some of its details are really out there.
Scammers Are Using Your Real Hotel Reservations to Trick You With Spear-Phishing Attacks Customer data from more than 350 hotels around the world may have been accessed as part of realistic reservation-hijacking scams.
What to Watch
AI outlook — possibilities, not facts
Further layoffs or restructuring at Meta.
Very likely · Within weeks
Increased regulatory scrutiny on Norse Atlantic Airways.
Likely · Within months
Increased public debate and potential protests regarding AI and surveillance.
Likely · Within months
Open Questions
- What specific user-auditing tools were developed during Palantir's Hack Week for ICE?
- What is the exact number of Meta employees being laid off and the total cost of severance packages?
- What is the precise function and oversight structure of the State Department's Office of Remigration?
- What specific 'anti-tech extremism' threats is US Law Enforcement concerned about?





