Between Aspiration and Reality: Europe’s Struggle for Digital Independence
“Digital sovereignty” is currently on everyone’s lips—especially in politics, across all major parties. The term has become such a defining buzzword that people have even begun to speak of sovereignty-washing. All the more reason to pause and evaluate whether, and to what extent, we have actually become more digitally sovereign.
By “we,” I mean we Europeans, who as a continent have surrendered our digital sovereignty in many respects: In the field of software, primarily to U.S. Big Tech companies that have managed to build billion-dollar business models from freely provided data. Of course, this data is collected within supposedly free applications—yet users actually “pay” with their attention, which they are forced to give to blinking advertising messages. And things can get even more drastic: Usage data can also serve state surveillance, as is the case in China.
In the field of hardware, the United States and Asian countries share dominance. Only recently have there been serious initiatives to produce computer chips in Europe again—with more or less success so far.
But it is not only the data collected by devices that technically belong to us—our phones, for example, which Google uses to make statements such as “This location is currently busier than usual.” It also concerns all the information we voluntarily and often unencrypted store on U.S. clouds. The U.S. Cloud Act obliges companies based there to hand over all data from their cloud services to U.S. authorities—regardless of whether the servers are physically located in Europe or not. AI systems that require enormous amounts of data for training further accelerate this development while raising new, as yet unresolved, copyright questions.
This was the situation in January—and unfortunately, little has improved since. Still, there is some good news: Schleswig-Holstein published its open-source strategy at the end of 2024 under the title “Advancing Digital Sovereignty, Strengthening the Local Digital Economy, Creating Trust and Transparency” and has already partially implemented it in 2025 [¹]. The initiative is even inspiring other federal states, such as Mecklenburg–Vorpommern [²]. Thuringia, for its part, declared “digital sovereignty” the central theme of its E-Government Congress this year [³], and has firmly anchored open standards in both its coalition agreement and its e-government legislation. So there are actors who recognize that software financed with public funds should benefit the public—in the spirit of “Public Money, Public Code.”
Open Source is increasingly being recognized in the private sector as well—not as an unwanted outsider but as a genuine, serious alternative. For example, major German car manufacturers have decided to jointly develop software solutions based on open-source technologies [⁴]. There is reason for hope.
But what else has happened? Big Tech is rallying behind Donald Trump. Microsoft has already demonstrated that it will comply with the wishes of the current U.S. administration at any time—for instance, when the email account of the International Criminal Court’s Chief Prosecutor, Karim Ahmad Khan, was suspended by Microsoft [⁵]. Microsoft and Amazon also denied an entire bank, the Amsterdam Trade Bank, access to its own data. And even unwelcome open-source developers have had their Microsoft accounts revoked [⁶]. Users of U.S. software also must expect license cost increases of unpredictable magnitude at any time [⁷].
Trump openly threatens retaliatory measures should Europe fail to roll back its innovative regulations—such as the exemplary GDPR, the Digital Services Act, or the Artificial Intelligence Act. And how does Europe respond? Instead of standing firm and finally enforcing that Big Tech companies pay appropriate taxes here, work is underway on the Digital Omnibus, which is supposed to be adopted later this year [⁸]. While certain bureaucratic reporting obligations may be reduced and the digital framework harmonized, an overall weakening of key regulations is planned. Especially with regard to the GDPR and the AI Act, I consider this irresponsible: it threatens informational self-determination and fosters the more or less uncontrolled advancement of what is, in my view, the most dangerous technology of our time—artificial intelligence—which already pervades nearly every area of life.
And as if all that were not enough, there is also the issue of sovereignty-washing: for instance, with the DELOS cloud, which remains dependent on Microsoft’s software updates—and therefore susceptible to pressure. In a statement by the German Informatics Society, they warn of the danger “that sovereignty-washing may channel significant funds from the billion-dollar ‘special assets’ into Big Tech” [⁹].
Thus, sadly, despite some shining individual projects, the overall trend is moving in the wrong direction. There is still a long way to go before Europe truly achieves digital sovereignty.
At DAASI International, we have been advocating digital sovereignty for a quarter of a century—long before the term even entered political discourse. Back then, we simply called it something else: open source, data protection, and open protocol standards. This triad will continue to guide our work in the future. And we will continue tirelessly contributing to digital independence in Germany and Europe. Not alone, but together with our long-standing partners who support our mission both technically and strategically, with our customers whose deliberate choice for open source significantly influences the overall direction, and finally with the companies that are connected with us through the Open Source Business Alliance.
[¹] https://www.schleswig-holstein.de/DE/landesregierung/themen/digitalisierung/linux-plus1
[³] https://digitales-infrastruktur.thueringen.de/e-government/e-government-kongress
[⁶] https://www.kuketz-blog.de/server-in-der-eu-und-eigene-schluessel-schuetzt-das-vor-us-zugriffen/
[⁸] https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/library/digital-omnibus-regulation-proposal
[⁹] https://gi.de/themen/beitrag/kritik-zu-souveraenitaets-washing-von-big-tech