Palantir’s $130 million IRS contract revealed in new report

Palantir has reportedly helped the Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) Criminal Investigations office investigate financial crimes in the U.S. for much of the last decade, according to a report by media outlet The Intercept. Public records show that the IRS, the U.S. federal tax agency, has paid the data analytics company $130 million since 2018 to use its data analysis software to analyze financial records for investigative purposes. These records, which detail the extent of Palantir’s IRS contract, were obtained by the nonprofit watchdog group American Oversight. While it was previously known that the IRS used Palantir’s products to automate and modernize audits, the full scale of the agency’s use of these tools for criminal investigations had not been previously reported.

The software, known as Palantir’s Lead and Case Analytics platform, is used to aggregate and analyze data across a variety of U.S. federal agencies. The platform has capabilities that allow investigators to find connections from millions of records with thousands of links between various databases. The tool is described as being particularly effective at mapping human relationships and communications by pulling together information from multiple sources, allowing investigators to pore over vast amounts of financial records to identify potential links and patterns.

Beyond its work with the IRS, Palantir is also reportedly assisting DOGE, the government efficiency initiative, with a project designed to access IRS records. This assistance was reported last summer. However, the growing footprint of Palantir’s tools across federal agencies has drawn legal scrutiny from watchdog groups. Earlier this week, American Oversight sued the Trump administration for public records related to numerous federal agencies’ use of Palantir tools, including the IRS.

Why it matters

The IRS has paid Palantir $130 million since 2018 to use its data analysis software for investigative purposes, with the extent of the agency’s use of the company’s tools previously unreported. The contract highlights how U.S. federal agencies use private data analytics tools to conduct financial investigations.