The Peter Thiel-chaired data intelligence group Palantir is suing a small Swiss magazine after it dared to report that Swiss federal authorities repeatedly rejected its services.
Palantir has filed a Swiss right of reply case against online outlet Republik after it published two articles in December saying Swiss officials raised concerns about data sovereignty and legal compliance, citing documents obtained through freedom of information requests.
Some European leaders are pushing to cut reliance on US tech as the Trump administration keeps needling the continent, and Palantir chief executive Alex Karp told investors there was “real hesitance” in parts of Europe towards adopting its tools.
Republik’s haul included an internal Swiss Armed Forces review from December 2024 that decided against using Palantir for military data, warning there was a risk US authorities could gain access to sensitive files.
Palantir’s lawsuit, filed in January, is not seeking damages or a libel action, but claims the company was not given sufficient rights to reply under Swiss media law.
Palantir said, “All we have asked Republik to do is to print our concise, fact-on-fact counter statement to their misleading reporting, that’s it. It’s our right under Swiss law,”
Republik managing director Katharina Hemmer said Palantir wanted the magazine to publish a lengthy counterstatement for each article, and the magazine believed those statements did not fairly address or rebut the reporting.
Right of reply actions are a standard tool in Switzerland, but it is unusual for a large international company to file one against a local media organisation, with a judge expected to decide in March.
The story has already spilled into UK politics, with backbench Labour MP Clive Lewis citing the Swiss report in a debate on defence contracts and saying “even the Swiss army has rejected Palantir as a platform on national security grounds”.
Republik described Palantir’s effort as a multiyear, cross-ministry push to embed itself in Swiss state infrastructure, involving the armed forces and defence ministry, the federal chancellery during Covid, the Federal Office of Public Health, the money-laundering reporting office and the Federal Statistical Office.
Palantir, which still gets a significant share of revenue from US government contracts, including defence and immigration work, said some non-US clients have leaned towards domestic providers.
Palantir said the Republik piece “paints a false and misleading picture” and added that it “hinders important discussions about the modernisation of European software and how technology should be procured.”
