Brussels, 18/02/2014 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission says that the statements by German Chancellor Angela Merkel on creating European cloud computing internet services are not at odds with its own vision for a safe and secure internet. On 17 February, Ryan Heath, the spokesman for Digital Agenda Commissioner Neelie Kroes, stated that “we support Chancellor Merkel's calls for better networks, and better data protection and security on those networks, as part of a broader digital industrial policy. (…) We need high-security and European-based digital business models. The networks must be open and safe and we need good internet governance. It is necessary for companies to work together in total security”.
Following the NSA phone tapping scandal, of which Merkel was herself a victim, the chancellor is currently looking at ways of providing the highest level of security for European data. In her weekly podcast, she announced that, on Wednesday, she intended to discuss the possibilities with the French president, François Hollande, for setting up a “European internet” which would allow for storing and processing personal data in Europe, without their having to go through the US, despite the majority of cloud computing services currently being American-owned. The chancellor declared that she wanted to discuss with France “the way in which we can maintain a high level of data protection… We will address the question of European access providers providing security for our citizens, so that no one has to send e-mails and other information to the other side of the Atlantic but can do so within a European communications network”. Commissioner Kroes has on numerous occasions expressed her wish to see European cloud services developed and her spokesman, Ryan Heath, also announced the publication next week of recommendations for the development of cloud services, drafted by the European partnership which was already set up two years ago (see EUROPE 10540). He noted the three concrete proposals the Commission has already presented to enhance European network security: 1) a directive on network security and information requiring co-operation from business and governments; 2) new data protection rules; 3) the “Connected Continent” for a single digital market which seeks, inter alia, to guarantee a rapid and open internet. Heath concluded that “we hope that Franco-German discussions on Wednesday, and the discussions with leading industrialists, will lead to an exhilaration of work on important European legislation in this domain”. (IL/transl.fl)