Europe Pushes for Tech Sovereignty Beyond Data Residency

Switzerland halted plans to use Amazon Web Services for its national digital ID, and the Netherlands blocked a US firm's acquisition of a Dutch cloud provider supporting its DigiD authentication system. The European Commission has launched a Cloud Sovereignty Framework with 48 criteria and awarded up to €180 million in contracts requiring sovereign cloud standards, while exploring an independent EU biometric testing capability to reduce reliance on US institutions like NIST. This is a concrete step toward Europe consolidating centralised technological and institutional control over digital identity and infrastructure.