Russ Bellant, Michigan: What is the real reason that Big Tech wants more data storage?

Russ Bellant, December 3, 2025

This is an open letter to you shared with thousands of Michigan residents: I strongly agree with the concerns about data centers using massive amounts of electricity that may require building more generating capacity, with likely costs to utility customers. Also with concerns about large water demands that could affect meeting water needs in certain geographic areas.

But I wish to emphasize an additional issue. What is the real reason that Big Tech wants more data storage? What is the nature of collections that their own systems will not be able to store and exploit?

Is it the massive data on consumers that will give Big Tech access to spending of everyone, including medical, travel, telephone usage, credit history, court records, email histories, facial recognition and retinal scans, as well as other minutiae of one’s life for dubious purposes? So many data centers are being proposed that we have to think beyond an entirely innocent purpose.

I am led to this concern by the White House giving Big Tech mogul Elon Musk immediate access to all federal databases with massive amounts of data on many tens of millions of  Americans, including IRS records and health records.Where did that data end up? In the hands of Palantir, owned by fellow zillionaire Peter Thiel, another mega-giant of Big Tech. His company has been a major CIA contractor for many years and is also collaborating with the Pentagon and with similar agencies in other parts of the world. He wrote a book years ago repudiating democracy.

One cannot dismiss the massive data collection motive for Big Tech when the White House and Congress surrender to this unmatched massive looting. There is much to be said about their end goals as they openly advocate for an end to democracy in books, in nazi salutes, and the funding of new nazi parties in Europe. But I will return to the point at hand. What is the real purpose of us sacrificing anything and permitting anything to enhance their capacity for ends that few understand and that Big Tech will never admit to?