{"id":14919,"date":"2026-04-15T12:38:13","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T12:38:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/14919\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T12:38:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T12:38:13","slug":"mps-campaigners-warn-uk-dependence-on-us-tech-firms-is-becoming-a-national-security-risk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/14919\/","title":{"rendered":"MPs, campaigners warn UK dependence on US tech firms is becoming a national security risk"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u2018Over-reliance on foreign tech companies is now an urgent national security issue\u2019 says ORG<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Digital rights campaigners and MPs have warned that the UK\u2019s heavy reliance on a small group of mainly US technology companies represents an economic, security and geopolitical risk.<\/p>\n

In a new report<\/a>, the Open Rights Group (ORG) takes aim at \u201cthe dominance of a few tech giants\u201d across UK government and business, which it says has led to vendor lock-in, inflated costs and \u201cthe extraction of value from the UK economy through tax avoidance and profit repatriation\u201d.<\/p>\n

ORG highlights risks to national security from surveillance, espionage and cyberattacks arising from this concentration of power, with the UK exposed to extra-territorial legislation such as the US Cloud Act and China\u2019s National Intelligence Law, which can compel tech companies to hand over data.<\/p>\n

It also criticises Big Tech lobbying, which it claims, \u201cdistorts policy-making, leading to weaker regulation, anti-competitive practices, and a centralised, abusive and anti-democratic digital information environment,\u201d and bemoans the fact that digital sovereignty is \u201cnoticeably absent from public UK policy documents\u201d.<\/p>\n

ORG recommends that, rather than defaulting to Big Tech, the UK should adopt a strategy of procuring locally developed open source solutions, which it argues would have a knock-on effect in supporting domestic technical capacity. It also recommends creating new institutions within government to help shape global rules, and that the UK should prioritise open standards and interoperability.<\/p>\n

It notes that European countries including Germany, France, the Netherlands and Denmark are actively pursuing digital sovereignty through investments in open technology and international collaboration, while the UK is increasing its spending on US hyperscalers even as it claims to support British AI and software industries.<\/p>\n

ORG CEO Jim Killock commented: \u201cThis over-reliance on foreign tech companies is now an urgent national security issue as well as an economic threat. The UK needs to follow the EU\u2019s lead and develop a digital sovereignty strategy that builds and deploys Open Source software and promotes international collaboration.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the Greens, Si\u00e2n Berry MP said: \u201cStriving for digital sovereignty … should be a top government objective, and is a massive chance to grow the UK\u2019s homegrown technology sector.\u201d<\/p>\n

Labour MP Clive Lewis pointed to the growing adoption of Palantir<\/a>, which he said, \u201cshould have no place in delivering UK public services.\u201d<\/p>\n

Liberal Democrat peer Lord Clement-Jones said: \u201cThe question now is whether we have the political courage to act. Every procurement decision that embeds foreign dependency, every compromise of sovereignty in the name of convenience, accumulates into strategic vulnerability.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u2018Over-reliance on foreign tech companies is now an urgent national security issue\u2019 says ORG Digital rights campaigners and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14920,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[5397,1877,23,31,3105,2364,6863,6864,6865,5,1261,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-14919","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uk","8":"tag-big-tech","9":"tag-cybersecurity","10":"tag-green-party","11":"tag-labour-party","12":"tag-liberal-democrats","13":"tag-national-security","14":"tag-open-rights-group","15":"tag-open-source","16":"tag-sovereignty","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-uk-government","19":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/116408765786020131","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14919","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14919"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14919\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14919"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14919"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14919"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}