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8/7/25, 10:54 AM Digital Sovereignty is far more than compliance - Middle East Business News and Information - mid-east.info
Digital Sovereignty is far more than compliance

August 6, 2025

By Julio Guijarro, CTO EMEA, Red Hat

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August, 2025 – I have honed my expertise in digital sovereignty in recent years largely as a
result of it being one of the things our EMEA-based partners and customers always ask about.

There is no one unifying reason for this increased interest in digital sovereignty, but rather
several converging factors are accelerating its urgency.

The most obvious is geopolitical instability. Sanctions and trade wars continue to disrupt global
business operations. As reported, a coalition of nearly 100 organisations has urged European

Commission leaders to establish a dedicated fund for building technological independence. In a
joint letter addressed to President Ursula von der Leyen and Digital Commissioner Henna

Virkkunen, the group advocated for strategic investments in homegrown infrastructure to
reduce reliance on non-European tech giants.

Another concern is that seemingly neutral cloud providers can become liabilities. One example
is the high profile move of a major hyperscaler to cut off the International Court of Justice’s

email access following political pressure, highlighting that vendor obligations can sometimes
override customer needs.

In addition to geopolitical concerns, regulatory pressure is also mounting, with regulations
like DORA (Digital Operational Resilience Act) and NIS2 in Europe requiring financial

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