44,000 people challenge use of their NHS data on Palantir platform

More than 44,000 people have submitted formal objections to their personal health information being processed through the NHS Federated Data Platform powered by US technology company Palantir.

The coordinated action, organised by campaign group 38 Degrees, uses rights under Article 21 of UK data protection law. Objectors have asked NHS England to prevent their information from being shared with, stored in or used through the platform and to suspend processing while their requests are considered.

The Federated Data Platform brings together information held across different NHS systems to support tasks including scheduling operations, managing waiting lists and planning hospital discharges. Palantir was awarded a seven-year contract worth £330 million to supply the technology.

Opposition to the arrangement has centred on concerns about patient confidentiality and Palantir’s wider work, including its involvement with the Israeli military and US immigration enforcement. Two House of Commons committees have called for the Government to consider using a break clause in the contract, which falls in February 2027.

Veronica Hawking, campaigns director at 38 Degrees, described the number of objections as a “huge wake-up call” for ministers. The action follows petitions signed by hundreds of thousands of people calling for the Palantir contract to be cancelled.

Palantir maintains that it cannot use NHS patient information for its own purposes and that data remains in the UK under the control of health service organisations. The company also argues that its technology is delivering measurable benefits, including additional operations, fewer delays in discharging long-stay patients and faster decisions for people undergoing cancer investigations.

NHS England said individual NHS organisations remain in control of their information within the platform and that suppliers cannot access it for their own purposes. It added that each objection would be considered in accordance with data protection law.

The dispute leaves NHS leaders balancing the potential operational benefits of connecting fragmented health information with growing public concern about who supplies the technology used to process some of the country’s most sensitive data.

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