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Agenda Item
5.4 26-0583 Subject: Peregrine Technologies Contract
From: Oakland Police Department
Recommendation: Adopt A Resolution (1) Authorizing The City Administrator To Enter Into A Three-Year Agreement With Peregrine Technologies For The Provision Of A Law Enforcement Records Search Platform And Related Services For The Oakland Police Department, At A Cost Not To Exceed One Million Twenty-Four Thousand Dollars ($1,024,000) For The Time Period July 1, 2026 To June 30, 2029; And (2) Waiving The Competitive Multiple Step Solicitation Process And The Local/Small Local Business Enterprise Requirements
I strongly oppose this contract. Oakland should not do business with a surveillance company with a documented history of human rights abuses and ties to international conflict. Our tax dollars should be divested from invasive policing technologies and reinvested into community resources like housing and healthcare that address the root causes of crime.
I strongly oppose this measure, and stand by much of what my fellow east bay residents are saying in other comments. Do not waste money on increased surveillance and call it “safety.” Do not compromise our privacy and call it “protection.” Do not invest in technologies that function on a principle of punishment. This will not make our communities stronger or safer. What WILL do that is investing in life-affirming programs and services that ensure everyone has access to housing, food, healthcare, education, culture and the arts. Do not waste our money on Peregrine or ANY surveillance technology.
I have lived in Oakland for 24 years. I unqualifiedly oppose the use of electronic surveillance in Oakland. And as such, I am against Oakland signing the no-bid OPD contract with Peregrine (Item #5.4) whose products have been built by former Palantir executives. Its products will be used for predictive flagging.
Peregrine's "technology" doesn't help law enforcement do their jobs. It is a poor crutch to mask incompetence, and the money would be better spent on training our brave and hard-working officers to do better detective work.
Do not waste our tax dollars on this junk! Vote no!
I strongly oppose this proposed contract with Peregrine Technologies. This company was founded by a former Palantir executive with the goal of turbocharging access to surveillance data. The result of this predictive policing technology is itself predictable: the continued over-policing of low-income communities of color.
I urge you to vote no on this proposed contract with Peregrine.
OPD argues that as more local agencies migrate away from CrimeTracer to Peregrine’s system, Oakland cannot share data with those agencies.
Peregrine is owned by Palantir, which regularly contracts with ICE. This opens up our immigrant community to dangers with potential data sharing.
CrimeTracer’s contract expires in June, and OPD argues it needs the new Peregrine contract before then—again, OPD put out no bids because no other company offers Peregrine’s service model. Peregrine service will cost about $330-350K per year, but there is no information about what the current Soundthinking platform costs.
Oakland does not need more surveillance and police presence in our communities. These contracts are a waste of money and put our city in cahoots with Palantir, owned by Peter Theil, a war mongering AI obsessed billionaire who does not care about our safety, privacy, or human rights. Please stop wasting our tax dollars and redirect police surveillance funds to projects that support Oaklanders wellbeing- ex. Fix the potholes, build safer pedestrian crossings, invest in schools, clean up litter, maintain our parks, decrease our costs of living like rent and utilities, etc.
Stop giving police access to technology that can be used to hurt the public.
I echo other community members and strongly oppose the use of this surveillance technology that has a track record of irresponsible use of its data and violating privacy laws.
I urge the Committee to reject or delay this $1,024,000 sole-source contract.
Not a like-for-like swap. OPD calls Peregrine a "records search platform" governed by the 2020 DGO written for IBM CopLink. But Peregrine's own materials (Attachment A) describe a "data integration platform" connecting RMS, CAD, ALPR, JMS, BWC, and NIBIN, supporting gang intelligence workflows, cell tower ping mapping, and RTCC operations. A vendor-neutral DGO cannot govern these broader capabilities. A Peregrine-specific Surveillance Impact Report is required under OMC 9.64 before approval.
The waiver is broader than disclosed. The resolution lets the City Administrator handle all extensions and related actions without returning to Council - unacceptable for a platform whose value is open-ended data integration.
Urgency is manufactured. OPD has known the June 30 expiration since the contract was signed. A short bridge preserves operations while allowing deliberation.
Sole-source logic is circular. "Other agencies use Peregrine" eliminates competition in this category permanently.
Unanswered: Does the contract prohibit sharing data with ICE/CBP absent a warrant? Does Peregrine retain rights to OPD data for model training? Which data sources will be ingested?
Action requested: Decline the waiver. Require a Peregrine-specific SIR and REIA, contract terms prohibiting federal data sharing without a warrant and vendor reuse of OPD data, and Council approval before new data sources are added.
My Beloved Council, I encourage a NO vote on the Cellebrite and Peregrine contracts. Spending more than a million dollars in no-bid contracts to half-ass surveillance firms while the OPD simultaneously asks to stop tracking the racial data required by city laws? Its just not a good look. It's technologically ignorant, fiscally irresponsible, and leaves Oakland liable.
The Council should directly oppose using systems that are designed to bypass the encryption on our personal devices. Digital privacy is a fundamental right, not an "administrative burden" for the anyone to eschew. Tools like Peregrine create a massive data dragnet that treats every person in Oakland like a suspect, which isn't the same thing as actual, effective policing.
Serious issues like human trafficking or violent crime need targeted, human-led investigations that actually find victims and break up networks. We don't need to spend $341,000 a year on a "data fusion" platform that just automates biased patterns and sweeps up the data of innocent people especially when 65% of those impacted are Black residents. Its one thing if the tech was a real solution, respecting our privacy, and following the law, but this proprietary unproven garbage tech wont make us any safer and fails to do anything but criminal cracking and database tracking. Reject these contracts in favor of a competitive bid process that respects the Privacy Ordinance, not vibe coded trash. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS IMPORTANT MATTER
As an Oakland resident, I strongly oppose this proposal. Expanding surveillance without clear safeguards puts residents’ privacy at risk and sets a precedent that’s hard to reverse. We should prioritize solutions that build trust and safety without increasing monitoring of our own community.
it's pretty clear that the people of Oakland oppose this measure, so the question becomes "Why is the City Council entertaining it?" and I suspect the reasons are not representative of the interests of the people of Oakland.
We know who owns and made Peregrine technologies and we know why. It is another attempt to implement a surveillance state in Oakland and as residents reject surveillance and the lie that it will improve public safety. Predictive policing is just another way to discriminate and criminalize already criminalized neighborhoods. I want to see Oakland City council stop investing our dollars in surveillance systems that stalk and criminalize us and invest in the things that will improve our lives, safety, and well-being. We already know what these things are- economic opportunities, social services, child care, health care. Not surveillance, not this Peregrine contract.
I strongly oppose this prospective partnership between the city of Oakland and Peregrine Technologies. Compiling police data into one platform that allows for predictive policing tactics will result in continued over-policing of low income neighborhoods that already deal with over-policing.
This perpetuates a self fulfilling prophecy: police expect that there will be more crime in certain neighborhoods based on historical, so they take predictive measures to prevent crime in those neighborhoods, thereby leading to more arrests in those areas.
We are already living under fascism during Trump’s second term as president. The residents of Oakland do not need their city to make matters worse by spending our taxpayer money to partner with another fascist technology company.
I urge you to vote NO on this prospective partnership with Peregrine Technologies.
Stop selling our personal data to unaccountable tech companies! The surveillance state does nothing to help regular people, it only makes our lives worse and is a huge waste of resources
Why are we selling out to powerful corporations with ulterior motives? Oakland City Council should protect the communities they represent from wealthy corporations with ulterior motives. We can keep each other safe if we design policies to do that; there is no reason for OPD to violate our rights to privacy by sharing our information with companies that will not actually keep us safe and our information private.
I strongly oppose the use of this surveillance technology that has a track record of using its data towards oppression of marginalized communities and violating privacy laws.
Every day we learn more about the dangers surveillance technology and the companies that run them, and yet our elected reps seem to be living in a different world. Local communities and major civil rights orgs like the ACLU have warned us against this technology because it’s harms marginalized communities, please don’t force this into our city
Peregrine is the regressive “innovation” of Palantir execs. This form of predictive flagging has a widely studied bias against Black, dark-skinned, and individuals from poor zip codes. Leading institutes like DAIR and predictive policing scholars are clear that this technology is too naive for deployment and civil rights advocates are clear that this is regressive. Oakland should be ashamed of considering this Trojan horse for our city.
I strongly oppose this contract. Oakland should not do business with a surveillance company with a documented history of human rights abuses and ties to international conflict. Our tax dollars should be divested from invasive policing technologies and reinvested into community resources like housing and healthcare that address the root causes of crime.
I strongly oppose this measure, and stand by much of what my fellow east bay residents are saying in other comments. Do not waste money on increased surveillance and call it “safety.” Do not compromise our privacy and call it “protection.” Do not invest in technologies that function on a principle of punishment. This will not make our communities stronger or safer. What WILL do that is investing in life-affirming programs and services that ensure everyone has access to housing, food, healthcare, education, culture and the arts. Do not waste our money on Peregrine or ANY surveillance technology.
Dear Councilmembers ~
I have lived in Oakland for 24 years. I unqualifiedly oppose the use of electronic surveillance in Oakland. And as such, I am against Oakland signing the no-bid OPD contract with Peregrine (Item #5.4) whose products have been built by former Palantir executives. Its products will be used for predictive flagging.
I implore you to vote against this contract.
Thank you.
Peregrine's "technology" doesn't help law enforcement do their jobs. It is a poor crutch to mask incompetence, and the money would be better spent on training our brave and hard-working officers to do better detective work.
Do not waste our tax dollars on this junk! Vote no!
I strongly oppose this proposed contract with Peregrine Technologies. This company was founded by a former Palantir executive with the goal of turbocharging access to surveillance data. The result of this predictive policing technology is itself predictable: the continued over-policing of low-income communities of color.
I urge you to vote no on this proposed contract with Peregrine.
OPD argues that as more local agencies migrate away from CrimeTracer to Peregrine’s system, Oakland cannot share data with those agencies.
Peregrine is owned by Palantir, which regularly contracts with ICE. This opens up our immigrant community to dangers with potential data sharing.
CrimeTracer’s contract expires in June, and OPD argues it needs the new Peregrine contract before then—again, OPD put out no bids because no other company offers Peregrine’s service model. Peregrine service will cost about $330-350K per year, but there is no information about what the current Soundthinking platform costs.
Oakland does not need more surveillance and police presence in our communities. These contracts are a waste of money and put our city in cahoots with Palantir, owned by Peter Theil, a war mongering AI obsessed billionaire who does not care about our safety, privacy, or human rights. Please stop wasting our tax dollars and redirect police surveillance funds to projects that support Oaklanders wellbeing- ex. Fix the potholes, build safer pedestrian crossings, invest in schools, clean up litter, maintain our parks, decrease our costs of living like rent and utilities, etc.
Stop giving police access to technology that can be used to hurt the public.
I echo other community members and strongly oppose the use of this surveillance technology that has a track record of irresponsible use of its data and violating privacy laws.
I urge the Committee to reject or delay this $1,024,000 sole-source contract.
Not a like-for-like swap. OPD calls Peregrine a "records search platform" governed by the 2020 DGO written for IBM CopLink. But Peregrine's own materials (Attachment A) describe a "data integration platform" connecting RMS, CAD, ALPR, JMS, BWC, and NIBIN, supporting gang intelligence workflows, cell tower ping mapping, and RTCC operations. A vendor-neutral DGO cannot govern these broader capabilities. A Peregrine-specific Surveillance Impact Report is required under OMC 9.64 before approval.
The waiver is broader than disclosed. The resolution lets the City Administrator handle all extensions and related actions without returning to Council - unacceptable for a platform whose value is open-ended data integration.
Urgency is manufactured. OPD has known the June 30 expiration since the contract was signed. A short bridge preserves operations while allowing deliberation.
Sole-source logic is circular. "Other agencies use Peregrine" eliminates competition in this category permanently.
Unanswered: Does the contract prohibit sharing data with ICE/CBP absent a warrant? Does Peregrine retain rights to OPD data for model training? Which data sources will be ingested?
Action requested: Decline the waiver. Require a Peregrine-specific SIR and REIA, contract terms prohibiting federal data sharing without a warrant and vendor reuse of OPD data, and Council approval before new data sources are added.
My Beloved Council, I encourage a NO vote on the Cellebrite and Peregrine contracts. Spending more than a million dollars in no-bid contracts to half-ass surveillance firms while the OPD simultaneously asks to stop tracking the racial data required by city laws? Its just not a good look. It's technologically ignorant, fiscally irresponsible, and leaves Oakland liable.
The Council should directly oppose using systems that are designed to bypass the encryption on our personal devices. Digital privacy is a fundamental right, not an "administrative burden" for the anyone to eschew. Tools like Peregrine create a massive data dragnet that treats every person in Oakland like a suspect, which isn't the same thing as actual, effective policing.
Serious issues like human trafficking or violent crime need targeted, human-led investigations that actually find victims and break up networks. We don't need to spend $341,000 a year on a "data fusion" platform that just automates biased patterns and sweeps up the data of innocent people especially when 65% of those impacted are Black residents. Its one thing if the tech was a real solution, respecting our privacy, and following the law, but this proprietary unproven garbage tech wont make us any safer and fails to do anything but criminal cracking and database tracking. Reject these contracts in favor of a competitive bid process that respects the Privacy Ordinance, not vibe coded trash. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS IMPORTANT MATTER
As an Oakland resident, I strongly oppose this proposal. Expanding surveillance without clear safeguards puts residents’ privacy at risk and sets a precedent that’s hard to reverse. We should prioritize solutions that build trust and safety without increasing monitoring of our own community.
it's pretty clear that the people of Oakland oppose this measure, so the question becomes "Why is the City Council entertaining it?" and I suspect the reasons are not representative of the interests of the people of Oakland.
We know who owns and made Peregrine technologies and we know why. It is another attempt to implement a surveillance state in Oakland and as residents reject surveillance and the lie that it will improve public safety. Predictive policing is just another way to discriminate and criminalize already criminalized neighborhoods. I want to see Oakland City council stop investing our dollars in surveillance systems that stalk and criminalize us and invest in the things that will improve our lives, safety, and well-being. We already know what these things are- economic opportunities, social services, child care, health care. Not surveillance, not this Peregrine contract.
I strongly oppose this prospective partnership between the city of Oakland and Peregrine Technologies. Compiling police data into one platform that allows for predictive policing tactics will result in continued over-policing of low income neighborhoods that already deal with over-policing.
This perpetuates a self fulfilling prophecy: police expect that there will be more crime in certain neighborhoods based on historical, so they take predictive measures to prevent crime in those neighborhoods, thereby leading to more arrests in those areas.
We are already living under fascism during Trump’s second term as president. The residents of Oakland do not need their city to make matters worse by spending our taxpayer money to partner with another fascist technology company.
I urge you to vote NO on this prospective partnership with Peregrine Technologies.
Adopting this technology in Oakland is a gift to the surveillance state that only harms regular citizens. Do not use this technology.
Stop selling our personal data to unaccountable tech companies! The surveillance state does nothing to help regular people, it only makes our lives worse and is a huge waste of resources
Why are we selling out to powerful corporations with ulterior motives? Oakland City Council should protect the communities they represent from wealthy corporations with ulterior motives. We can keep each other safe if we design policies to do that; there is no reason for OPD to violate our rights to privacy by sharing our information with companies that will not actually keep us safe and our information private.
Please do not allow Peregrine in our community.
I strongly oppose the use of this surveillance technology that has a track record of using its data towards oppression of marginalized communities and violating privacy laws.
Every day we learn more about the dangers surveillance technology and the companies that run them, and yet our elected reps seem to be living in a different world. Local communities and major civil rights orgs like the ACLU have warned us against this technology because it’s harms marginalized communities, please don’t force this into our city
Peregrine is the regressive “innovation” of Palantir execs. This form of predictive flagging has a widely studied bias against Black, dark-skinned, and individuals from poor zip codes. Leading institutes like DAIR and predictive policing scholars are clear that this technology is too naive for deployment and civil rights advocates are clear that this is regressive. Oakland should be ashamed of considering this Trojan horse for our city.