Microsoft Corporation (Microsoft) has announced it will build new data centers in Germany. The company, famed as a software company that has transitioned to cloud services, is making the move to address concerns in Germany regarding the safety of data that is based in the United States. The centers will also ensure that Microsoft meets German data sovereignty laws that require data on German citizens to be held within Germany’s borders.
Microsoft will provide Azure, Office 365 and Dynamics CRM Online services from two new German data centers. Servers at the center will be managed by German company Deutsche Telekom, meaning Microsoft will not be able to access its German customers’ data without their express permission. This also means German data will not be accessible by the authorities in the United States – a major concern in the German cloud market as a result of Edward Snowden's 2013 revelations about the monitoring activities if the United States' National Security Agency (NSA).
Snowden's revelations have had a major impact on the United States' cloud industry which lost foreign customers due to security concerns. Snowden suggested that that data stored by cloud providers like Microsoft was regularly breached by the NSA. To overcome these issues, Microsoft and other cloud companies have intensified efforts to build data centers both in Germany and other European countries (like the United Kingdom and Ireland). "These data centers will ensure that customers' data remains in Germany and that a German company controls access to data in accordance with German law", suggested Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft said in Berlin.
What do you think about cloud companies building data centers outside the United States. Add your comments below.
