On November 17, 2018, American missionary John Allen Chau attempted to evangelise the uncontacted people of North Sentinel Island in the Bay of Bengal. Carrying a GoPro and waterproof Bible, he smuggled himself into the protected zone and was quickly speared — the latest in a long line of outsiders killed there. Authorities refused to retrieve his body, but missionary groups demanded its return.

Soon enough, Australian tech moguls Scott Farquhar and Mike Cannon-Brookes allegedly launched a “philanthropic” expedition with two aims: retrieve Chau’s body, and bring the island’s people and culture to the world. I was given an invitation to board the return voyage, granted full access to document what they called “the final frontier of civilisation.”

This is what happened after.

How did we get here?

It’s five o’clock in the evening. I’m jet-lagged beyond repair, lounging around on the deck of the HMS Aspiration, a creaking old East Indiaman that smells of varnish, diesel, and a whiff of carefully-orchestrated PR. We’re spending the night anchored offshore before heading back to the airport at Port Blair. Across from me sits Alexis Wright, Waanyi woman and author. She’s tilting her head as she speaks — or maybe it’s the tilt of the ship. As I ponder this, she tells me about the Andaman Boobook, an owl native to these islands. Big black pupils, yellow rings like road reflectors in the dark.

“This bird, is it an omen? A warning?”

Smiling almost imperceptibly, she replies: “A warning of what?” She suggests I worry about the expedition’s patrons instead. She reckons the return of Chau’s body is an excuse for the British and their pals Down Under to grab the last untouched resource on Earth.

“At first glance those two are benign,” she says. “Net-zero projects, university donations. But where does that money come from? Data centres slurping our rivers dry. Undersea cables at Murrumujuk Beach up north. HQ on Eora country.”

I gesture toward the island — a few square kilometres of jungle surrounded by bleached-out coral and maritime hostilities.

“What can they possibly extract from that?”

She leans in:

“They’re collaborating with the British Museum.”

In my line of journalism, artistic liberties are encouraged. Whistleblowers are taken at their word. When the world is already surreal, accuracy becomes a secondary concern. “ATLASSIAN COLONISES NORTH SENTINEL ISLAND” is the kind of headline editors dream about. The only question I’m obliged to ask is how?

Before I can respond, a white-haired man carrying a piccolo sits down at our table. Claude Lévi-Strauss. Structural anthropologist. Dead, notably. Another man appears beside him in a black turtleneck and scarf.

“Edward Saïd,” he says, shaking my hand. “Good to meet you.”

I can’t believe my luck — this story will write itself.

Usually, I prise the truth out of people the old-fashioned way: free drinks and camaraderie. By the end of the night, I should be the person they choose to write their obituary and hold their hand during an enema. But even once they trust me enough to talk, the only truth I’ll get is the truth they’re willing to give. They get to control the narrative; that’s the appeal. The alternative? No story at all.

A journalist and three post-colonialists walk into a bar

“So Strauss is here to research,” I say. “And you’re here to advise?”

Saïd nods.

“To prevent the expedition from crossing the line between research and exploitation,” he says. “Though that line moves constantly, depending on their objectives.”

Strauss sighs.

“They want our unrestrained advice until it becomes inconvenient.”

“These men champion the politics of insert-minority-here,” Saïd adds. “We are applauded when we validate them and denounced when we don’t. And at the same time, if we happen to agree with ‘the oppressor’, we’re labelled comprador intellectuals by our own people.”

“What will you do this time?” I ask.

They exchange glances. They’re following two contradictory orders: Atlassian’s and mine. Saïd takes a leap.

“The scientists sampled Sentinelese land and water for climate modelling,” Saïd says finally. “Perhaps a harmless act of generosity, or perhaps a violation of spiritual law. They never thought to ask.”

“And what will they do with the results?” Strauss adds. “Justify intervention? Protectionism?”

Saïd leans closer.

“They measured the Sentinelese’s neural responses as they learned those precious first fragments of English.”

“Hello, you, me, tomorrow, non-disclosure agreement,” Strauss murmurs.

The expedition, it seems, was a neocolonial research bonanza. By week three they were already discussing compensation — which, alongside an NDA, is usually a sign of legally dubious actions. Saïd recounts a conversation he overheard.

“I s’pose we should probably pay them,” Cannon-Brookes said.

“How do you compensate a Neolithic tribe? Coconuts?” Farquhar joked.

A pause, then: “What about Bitcoin?”

“Even if they can’t use it, in theory they’re rich.”

I’ve met evil before. Usually it’s subtle. Institutional. Abstract. But sometimes it’s just two guys with startup money and a knack for keeping the right people silent.

I glance at Wright, who’s been waiting to tell me about her British Museum theory.

“Tell me more.”

Breakfast with Satan

By morning we’re inching towards Port Blair. Twelve hours left.

I meet Farquhar and Cannon-Brookes at the café on deck. They order smashed avocado toast and settle into their wicker chairs like they just came back from an ayahuasca-slash-ice bath retreat.

“This isn’t exactly Atlassian’s average project. What’s it all about?”

“The expedition was philanthropic at heart,” Farquhar explains.

“We’re giving back,” Cannon-Brookes says. “Recovering Chau’s body. Studying climate resilience. Harnessing our expertise to protect one of the oldest cultures on Earth.”

“Your expertise is in software engineering,” I point out.

They grin.

“We drew on our technological toolset…”

“And our blue-sky thinking.”

I raise my eyebrows. Farquhar tells me they’ve got a very special collaboration brewing. “It’s with a certain historical institution.” I’m curious about the legality of the deal, but before I can ask, Cannon-Brookes hands me a manila folder with a document inside. It begins:

Michael Cannon-Brookes, regarding the People of North Sentinel Island, appoints a functionary authorised to arbitrate recognition of his sovereign authority…

The People of North Sentinel Island agree to yield the exclusive rights to their languages, writings, oral histories, biological likenesses, and any other data…

“What does this mean?” I ask.

Cannon-Brookes takes my phone and holds it up to my face.

“Biometric data,” he says. “Your phone recognises your face. Apple stores it. You agreed to it in the terms and conditions.”

I stare at him.

“Well,” he says casually, “so did the Sentinelese.”

Vacuuming souls — from the Bay of Bengal to the British Museum

I find Alexis Wright at the bow of the ship at sunset. I’m here to tell her about the interview, only to find that, yet again, she’s ahead of me.

“Have you heard of data extractionism?” I haven’t. “It’s the digital version of mining. When corporations run out of data, they harvest it from the global south — faces, voices, movements. Cheap labour scrapes the internet while algorithms digest entire populations. And bias is built in,” she continues. “Train surveillance systems on Black neighbourhoods and they learn that Blackness equals crime.”

“So Atlassian scraped the island?”

She shakes her head.

“The people.”

Finally, the scoop: the researchers used biometric scanners to capture Sentinelese faces, gait patterns, and biological samples — blood, hair, skin — alongside their culture and language. Apparently, the device responsible is stored somewhere in the ship’s hold, a small camera-like machine called the “little black box”.

Why?

“It seems Atlassian has been toying with holograms.”

Half the expedition, she claims, is AI-generated — partly because the real Edward Saïd refused to join, partly to test a beta program. Atlassian will turn the Sentinelese into an immersive, interactive cultural experience at the British Museum. It’s the newest frontier of colonialism, brought to you by Atlassian.

We chuck neocolonialism overboard

We are thirty minutes from Port Blair when Wright leads me below deck. The hull groans and corridors twist through the ship’s belly until we reach a storage compartment stacked with crates. Inside are hard drives, test tubes, cables still caked with wax.

And the little black box.

It’s smaller than I expected — a square device with a round lens and tiny green lights flickering inside. I can’t help imagining they’re souls trapped behind glass as I stuff the device under my jacket and resurfacing to the deck.

Everyone is distracted — Saïd et al. at the bar, Farquhar and Cannon-Brookes leaning over the rail, watching ferries glide into port. Perfect timing.

I remove the device. Sunlight hits the lens and the water below, both glittering. Then I let go.

For a moment the box is suspended mid-air, frozen in time. I see my reflection in the lens, trapped inside with those green lights. I watch my face as it hurtles towards the dark blue of the Bay of Bengal, never to be seen again. That data belongs to no one but the Sentinelese and the ocean floor.