Digital sovereignty has become a strategic issue for businesses and public organizations. With the growing number of cyberattacks, European regulations, and increasing dependence on foreign technology providers, the question of data control is now at the heart of many organizations’ concerns.
In this context, sovereign cloud is often presented as one of the solutions for regaining control over digital assets.
But one essential question needs to be asked:
Is a sovereign cloud enough to truly guarantee the sovereignty of the data stored within it?
Sovereign Cloud: Controlling Your Environment
The concept of sovereign cloud is based, among other things, on controlling the infrastructure where data is hosted.
This may involve:
– Hosting data in France or Europe
– Infrastructure operated by European providers
– Greater control over how data can be accessed
– Compliance with European regulations
– Reducing dependence on certain non-European technology providers.
This approach addresses an important part of the challenges associated with digital sovereignty.
However, controlling the infrastructure and where data is hosted is not, by itself, enough to guarantee data confidentiality.
Because data remains exposed whenever an unauthorized person or system can potentially access it.
Sovereignty Does Not Stop at the Infrastructure
Imagine an organization storing its data on infrastructure that is fully controlled and compliant with sovereignty requirements.
What happens if an administrator account is compromised?
What happens in the event of stolen credentials, a compromised workstation, or an intrusion into the information system?
An attacker could then gain access to the stored data, even if the underlying infrastructure itself meets sovereignty requirements.
This is why another layer of protection needs to be considered: the sovereignty of the data itself.
Truly Sovereign Data Must Remain Under Your Control
To genuinely strengthen data sovereignty, several elements need to be controlled.
Encryption
Encryption makes data unreadable to anyone who does not have the necessary means to decrypt it.
As a result, even if an attacker gains unauthorized access to the infrastructure, the data can remain protected.
Protection in the Event of a Compromise
An organization’s security should not rely solely on its ability to prevent an intrusion.
It must also be able to limit the consequences of a compromise.
Strongly encrypted data can remain unusable to an attacker who manages to bypass certain security barriers.
Control Over Encryption Keys
Encryption is only truly sovereign when the organization retains control over its encryption keys.
The question is therefore not only:
“Where is my data stored?”
It is also:
“Who controls the keys that provide access to it?”
This distinction is critical when it comes to ensuring the confidentiality and control of sensitive data.
Access Control
Finally, sovereignty also means maintaining precise control over who can access information.
Users, applications, and services should only have the permissions they need to perform their duties.
Sovereign Cloud and Sovereign Data: Two Complementary Approaches
Sovereign cloud and sovereign data should not necessarily be viewed as opposing concepts.
These two approaches address different but complementary challenges
Sovereign cloud primarily aims to ensure control over the environment in which data is hosted and processed.
Data protection, on the other hand, aims to ensure that the data itself remains confidential and under control, even when its environment is compromised.
This distinction can be summarized simply:
Sovereign cloud protects the environment.
Sovereign data protects the information itself.
This complementarity becomes particularly important in hybrid and multi-cloud environments, as well as in the SaaS solutions widely used by organizations today.
Sovereignty Must Follow the Data
Today, data moves across many different environments: business applications, cloud platforms, collaboration tools, workstations, file-sharing solutions, backups, and storage infrastructures.
In this context, limiting sovereignty to the location where data is stored may not be enough.
The real question therefore becomes:
How can organizations maintain control over their data, regardless of the environment in which it is used?
At DIFENSO, we believe that sovereignty must first and foremost be embedded in the data itself.
Our approach is based on encrypting sensitive data, maintaining control over encryption keys, and protecting information regardless of its storage environment.
The objective is simple: make data unreadable and unusable to anyone who is not authorized to access it.
Conclusion
Sovereign cloud is an important response to the challenges of digital sovereignty. However, it should not be considered a complete solution on its own.
Hosting data in a sovereign environment does not, by itself, guarantee that the data will remain confidential under all circumstances.
Digital sovereignty should therefore be approached at several levels:
Infrastructure + encryption + control of encryption keys + access control.
Because beyond where your data is stored, the fundamental question remains the same:
Who can actually read, use, and maintain control over it?