[citation needed] i2 developed software products for visualisation and analysis of disparate data sources to aid criminal investigation, and which were later also used by other branches of government (including anti-terrorism, military intelligence and defence), as well as commercial fraud.

Product capability and range was expanded from law enforcement, for use across industries including government, military and national defence and public safety, as well as commercial fraud prevention.

[4] Shyam Sankar, Palantir’s director of business development, used a private eye company as the cutout for obtaining i2's code.

[4] In December 2021, IBM announced that it will be divesting the i2 family of products to N. Harris Computer Corporation, a division of Constellation Software.

The i2 Link Notebook enabled investigators to create entity relationship diagrams (a kind of visual database) allowing raw intelligence – largely textual reports (e.g. witness statements) – to be entered manually, revealing the relationships within the data and enabling data from different sources to be collated and graded.

Automatic and manual layouts, and the ability to create, share, search, analyse and crucially print, even extremely large charts (sometimes tens of metres in length), dramatically improved law enforcement's ability to understand and communicate the status of investigations, and to direct and manage the process.

The first such database interface was to HOLMES 2 (Home Office Large Major Enquiry System), and subsequently many different SQL and even free text data sources.

This was part of the Human Terrain System, a United States Army program which embeds social scientists with combat brigades.