USA Today Co. is leaning further into artificial intelligence, using it not just to generate content but also to analyze the people consuming it.
What happened?
According to Nieman Lab, USA Today Co. — the company formerly known as Gannett and the largest newspaper publisher in the United States — disclosed in its second-quarter earnings call that it is working with Palantir, a controversial firm that deals in widespread surveillance and defense.
As Futurism noted, CEO Mike Reed told investors during the call that the company wants to use Palantir's AI platform to "build a common intelligence layer" drawn from reader data and gather "actionable intelligence."
"Every visit, every session, and every moment of attention creates a signal," Reed said.
Executives noted connecting those audience signals can improve monetization. Kristin Roberts, president of USA Today Media, pointed to commerce as one likely use case, saying the technology could help automatically identify affiliate-link opportunities tied to content, per Futurism.
Still, the full scope of the partnership remains unclear, including whether it will extend much beyond the kinds of tracking and audience analysis already common across the web.
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Why does it matter?
Much of the scrutiny comes from Palantir's track record.
It is not a standard media-tech supplier, and it has faced criticism for its work with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement as well as for providing AI tools to military clients, making any new arrangement involving consumer data especially sensitive.
The concern goes beyond whether a news site understands which stories perform well. It also involves whether publishers can increasingly connect browsing habits, shopping behavior, and engagement patterns in ways that deepen profiling and make those links more valuable to advertisers and commerce partners.
AI's rapid expansion also carries implications beyond privacy. Running AI systems and the data centers that support them requires large amounts of electricity and water, putting pressure on local resources and often raising utility rates for billpayers.
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At the same time, AI can help utilities forecast energy demand, cut waste, and better integrate cleaner energy onto the grid. The technology can be both a useful tool and a growing source of strain, depending on how it is deployed.
USA Today has already experimented with AI in its newsroom and business operations, so the partnership suggests publishers increasingly see AI not only as a writing assistant but also as a business engine for extracting more value from audience data.
What can I do?
Readers may not be able to directly influence corporate data deals, but they can take steps to reduce how much information they give away.
Reviewing cookie settings, rejecting nonessential trackers, and limiting personalization options can all shrink the data stream many websites depend on.
Privacy-focused browsers, tracker blockers, and separate email addresses for newsletters or shopping can also make it harder for companies to piece together a fuller profile. If you click on product roundups or affiliate links, those actions may feed analytics and monetization systems.
Reading privacy policies more carefully and supporting outlets that clearly explain what data they collect and how they use it can also help. In some states, privacy laws may allow readers to request access to or deletion of certain personal data.
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