Europe’s New Age of Digital Sovereignty

Developing the best technology is the goal for any business. Without the best teams for research and development, it would be difficult to achieve this goal, which is where many governments step in to incentivise and regulate. The digital world is changing rapidly so it is paramount to remain competitive and foster technological advances to be the best. Many governments run into issues surrounding control and access to digital technology that many are turning to their own citizens to develop homegrown digital infrastructure. The goal is not solely regulation but also to invest in new systems that are locally compatible. With the European Union looking to advance itself in digital sovereignty, they can move away from their dependency on the United States and China for their technological needs.

In the last five years, the EU has developed digital sovereignty with new policies by establishing the Digital Markets Act (DMA), the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the Artificial Intelligence Act (AI Act), with the purpose to regulate the digital economy as well as emerging technologies within the bloc. The need for ownership, standards, and infrastructure is crucial for security purposes and relying on foreign powers to manage the fundamentals is a huge risk. Several countries are wary of Chinese-made equipment and Brussels is cracking down on countries who have 5G network equipment from Huawei. The EU also has significantly higher standards compared to the United States as exemplified in the recent concerns of Artificial Intelligence. The EU and the United Kingdom are investigating the tech company X, formally Twitter, over concerns that its AI tool Grok was used to create sexualised images of real people. This would be a breach in the Digital Services Act and the EU commission could fine the company up to 6% of its global annual turnover. When it comes to ownership, other countries having or restricting access to the data flow raises security concerns of how the information is collected as well as how the technology is implemented for criminal activities.

With new investment into defence and security, innovative technology will be a critical factor for infrastructure. The digital arena has already seen cyberattacks from unfriendly neighbours as well as physical damage to undersea cables in the Baltics. The need for digital sovereignty was sent into hyperdrive when the threat of tariffs was issued from the United States over the enforcement of the EU’s digital rules. The risk to the digital security of the EU is becoming a mobilising factor for some governments to start turning away from US technology. France has announced that American platforms, such as Microsoft Teams and Zoom, will be replaced with Visio. This platform is a domestically developed video conferencing platform, which will be implemented in all government departments by 2027. Other countries, such as the Netherlands, are concerned about the US acquiring EU technology that is necessary for everyday life. A Dutch cloud provider Solvinity provides services to the online identification tool DigiD, which is used for renting a house to making doctor’s appointments. With so much personal data of the Dutch accessible to the U.S. company, and many U.S. tech companies are not known to stand up to the Trump Administration, it is understandable that this acquisition would be a huge security risk for the Netherlands. People have become reliant on technology and much of it comes from outside the EU borders. Digital sovereignty is more important now for the EU while geopolitical relations will continue to be volatile for the near future.