Google, Microsoft, IBM and other U.S.-based firms that have invested billions in European datacenters are urging the EU to take action to standardize laws and regulations governing cloud computing across the member countries. Of particular interest for these companies are the multitude of country-defined current privacy laws, which make it difficult to open the cloud to more types of services and also complicate remote storage.
As it stands, each country has its own strictures governing data storage and privacy, among other things, and from the way it looks now, they are sticking to their guns and advocating for the right to create and abide by their own tech standards. All of this could change when the European Commission calls its Digital Agenda, which will touch on these issues in addition to those of a larger including broadband access and piracy. As Matthew Newman, a spokesman for the EU told the Wall Street Journal, “it’s way too early to say whether the EU directive will create a pan-European authority” in the cloud.
Major U.S. Tech Firms Pressure EU for Cloud Standards
July 29, 2010