Brussels, 15/07/2014 (Agence Europe) - Last week in Brussels, European Commissioner for the Digital Agenda Neelie Kroes presented a new internet site that had been set up to answer the questions facing small and medium-sized enterprises on “cloud computing”. The “Cloud Scout” site seeks to provide assurances for companies with regard to issues of security and privacy protection when using cloud computing services (Info: http://www.cloudwatchhub.eu/cloudscout ). The commissioner used this occasion to again call for the new European Commission to be staffed by “pro-digital” commissioners.
Before the European elections, Kroes had called on candidates for the Commission presidency to make a firm commitment to the digital agenda. This request was repeated by the European Digital Forum reflection group, which sent an open letter on 8 May to candidates asking them to highlight the importance of the digital economy (see EUROPE 11075). Jean-Claude Juncker responded by asserting that the idea of a single digital market was one of the five priorities in his campaign. Kroes advised the future president of the Commission to structure the forthcoming directorates-general (DG) around digital objectives and that an entire strategy should be formed around digital technology. Kroes said that“it is not only important that we have a digital president in Jean-Claude but that Jean-Claude forms his team with all digital commissioners, not just the one taking over my portfolio”. She added that she was going to ask Juncker to be “very sharp” in his efforts to put together a fully competent digital team, even though his room for manoeuvre is limited in that it will be the member states which will be submitting their candidates to the Commission. (IL)