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<\/p>\nGoogle follows Microsoft in taking measures to prevent cloud customers from becoming trade war casualties<\/p>\n
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Google is the latest cloud giant to reinforce its sovereign cloud credentials in a bid reassure Europeans concerned about US interference.<\/strong><\/p>\n Google has beefed-up its \u2018sovereign cloud\u2019 services in a bid to assuage customers concerned that the Trump administration in Washington could interfere in cloud services run by US providers.<\/p>\n These measures include a Google Cloud Data Boundary enabling customers to dictate where their content is stored and processed.<\/p>\n \u201cThis boundary also allows customers to store and manage their encryption keys outside Google\u2019s infrastructure, which can help customers meet their specific data access and control requirements no matter what market,\u201d wrote Hayete Gallot, president of customer experience, Google Cloud, in a blog posting<\/a> explaining the policy changes.<\/p>\n Moreover, customers using \u201ca large set of Google Cloud products\u201d, including AI services can enable a series of capabilities including Confidential Computing and External Key Management to control access to their data and deny access for any reason.<\/p>\n Users of Google Workspace will also gain the ability to choose between either the US or EU for the processing of their content and can choose a country for data storage using client-side encryption to prevent any undesired access \u2013 whether from any government or Google.<\/p>\n It\u2019s not clear how such a policy would work in the UK, should the government press ahead with demands for encryption backdoors<\/a>.<\/p>\n Google Cloud Air-Gapped, meanwhile, \u201coffers a fully standalone and air-gapped solution that does not require connectivity to an external network. This solution is tailored for customers in the intelligence, defence, and other sectors with strict data security and residency requirements\u201d, added Gallot.<\/p>\n He added: \u201cIt is built with open-source components and comes with a targeted set of AI, database, and infrastructure services.\u201d<\/p>\n Like Microsoft, Google also offers its cloud services via third-parties to meet national requirements. For example, it has worked with France\u2019s Thales to build a Trusted Cloud offering by Thales subsidiary S3NS , to meet local sovereignty demands in Europe, which bundles Thales\u2019 cyber security offerings into the package.<\/p>\n Google is not the first or only company to take action to defend its sovereign cloud offerings. In April, Microsoft vice president Brad Smith vowed to sue should Azure be targeted in any of the US government\u2019s trade wars<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the unlikely event we are ever ordered by any government anywhere in the world to suspend or cease cloud operations in Europe\u2026 Microsoft will promptly and vigorously contest such a measure using all legal avenues available,\u201d said Smith told customers at an event in Brussels.<\/p>\n The company, he said, had taken multiple measures to put its cloud offerings in Europe legally beyond the reach of the US government, including a legally binding European Digital Resilience Commitment.<\/p>\n That came less than a year after Microsoft had admitted that it couldn\u2019t guarantee that UK policing data stored in Azure would remain in the UK<\/a>.<\/p>\n