Google’s 'China Links' Need FBI, CIA Investigation, Says Billionaire Peter Thiel

Billionaire investor Peter Thiel has called for a high-level probe by the FBI and CIA into Google’s alleged “treasonous China links.”

Delivering a keynote address at the National Conservatism Conference in Washington, D.C named as “The Star Trek Computer Is Not Enough” Thiel raised three questions on Google.

Expressing the apprehension that Chinese intelligence has infiltrated Google, the billionaire investor sought to validate his assumptions on the basis of the search giant's recent business decisions.

Thiel is known as a strong supporter of President Donald Trump in Silicon Valley. He is also a board member of Facebook.

Thiel’s three questions to Google

In all the questions, the common thread was China. The billionaire blasted the search engine for its decision to work with China.

According to Axios' report, Thiel said these are questions that “need to be asked by the FBI, by the CIA.”

Thiel’s first question was how many foreign intelligence agencies have infiltrated Google’s Manhattan Project for artificial intelligence (AI)?

The second one was whether the senior management of Google feels infiltrated by Chinese intelligence?

The third was why did Google choose to work with the Chinese military and not with the US military?

However, Google did not react to the CNBC request for comments.

Theil said these questions need to be asked: “in a not so excessively gentle manner.”

In June 2018, Google decided not to renew a contract with the U.S. Defense Department on a project that analyzed data from drone videos using artificial intelligence.

The tech company decided to end that partnership as protests from employees flared up and they signed a petition urging the company to back off.

Google came under fire last year after leaked reports suggested that the company is working on a censored search service in China departing from its ideological positions in the past.

While Google defended internally that it was an attempt to expand the web search market, employees mounted severe protests.

The company has reportedly dumped the China search project named Dragonfly.

So far there are no reports to suggest infiltration by foreign intelligence agencies into Google.

However, Thiel’s company Palantir is working with the Trump administration and has reportedly compiled vast data on U.S. citizens.

It is unclear if Thiel has some exclusive information about Google or the alleged intelligence activities by Chinese agencies.

Concern over lack of political correctness

In the keynote, Thiel also criticized Americans for lacking the desired political correctness.

Expressing concern over Americans becoming too fat and addicted to drugs Thiel said that, “the biggest problem in our society is the problem of political correctness.”

“American exceptionalism has led us to a country that is exceptionally overweight, exceptionally addicted to opioids, exceptionally unaware and exceptionally un-self-reflective,” Thiel quipped.

Other speakers at the conference were national security advisor John Bolton, talk show host Tucker Carlson, and Senator Josh Hawley.