opinion industry-news
The EU’s Sovereignty crisis#
In May, Microsoft at the behest of a foreign government froze the accounts of the International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan1. His Microsoft account has (as of Friday, August 29th, 2025) not been restored, 3 months later.
This action was taken unilaterally by a foreign actor, the president of the United States of America via executive order
The United States will impose tangible and significant consequences on those responsible for the ICC’s transgressions, some of which may include the blocking of property and assets, as well as the suspension of entry into the United States of ICC officials, employees, and agents, as well as their immediate family members, as their entry into our Nation would be detrimental to the interests of the United States.
…
All property and interests in property that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of any United States person, of the following persons are blocked and may not be transferred, paid, exported, withdrawn, or otherwise dealt in:
(i) the person [Karim Khan] listed in the Annex to this order
There is no recourse, legal or otherwise. No judicial body to request relief from.
In June, Anton Carniaux, the director of public affairs for Microsoft France, a supposedly European sub entity of Microsoft admitted that data on European citizens could be transmitted to the United States for processing2. (reporting by the The Register)
These are not isolated incidents. In an increasingly multi-polar world European citizens and businesses must look to ourselves to strengthen our defenses against foreign inference in our affairs.
Safeguarding our businesses#
Your business’ data is it’s lifeblood. Intellectual property, contacts, processes and people. These are what make your business successful and when you put them on servers and services rented from foreign organizations beholden to foreign governments, you risk losing everything that makes your business valuable.
Its time to make a change. Switch to European aligned service providers like Hetzner or OVHCloud for storing your business critical infrastructure.
Look into switching to OpenDesk, a fully European (funded by the EU itself!) Microsoft Office alternative.
Investigate free and Open Source alternates to foreign controlled components of your business process stack.
Join us in keeping European data in Europe
Need help?#
If you have any questions or need help in navigating the shift to data sovereignty, feel free to reach out to our team of specialists.
We can assist you with setting up a Private Cloud, handle the migration effort and provide training courses to upskill your staff.
Click here to get in touch.