Sovereign Shield platform provides solutions for collecting and managing data across jurisdictions.

Atos has unveiled OneCloud Sovereign Shield, a suite of tools aimed at addressing the digital sovereignty needs of governments and industry.

The company’s Sovereign Shield platform is a collection of solutions, methodologies and cloud services that allow customers to manage their data in the cloud while conforming to high jurisdictional data governance requirements. With these edge-to-cloud tools, clients can improve the level of control they have over the data they produce and share with other entities while remaining compliant with any legal requirements. The set of tools is part of the company’s One Cloud initiative.

What Is Digital Sovereignty? And How Does It Affect Your Business and Personal life?

The World Economic Forum defines digital sovereignty as the ability of a person, business or government to control their own digital presence: the data, hardware and software they create and rely on to function in today’s world.

Every year, a massive volume of data is created, shared and stored, and that amount will only grow. In fact, by 2024, it’s expected that 149 zettabytes—one zettabyte is a trillion gigabytes—of data will be created, copied and accessed around the world.

Policymakers are becoming increasingly concerned that a significant amount of that control is handed over to too few entities, there is a lack of choice in the technology market and too much power in the hands of a few giant tech companies.

Products such as Atos’ Sovereign Shield could be invaluable tools to address those concerns. Sovereign Shield contains a range of risk controls that industry and governments can deploy. They are customizable to their jurisdictional requirements and sensitivity of their clients’ data, which will allow them to segregate data, infrastructure, applications, security and operations in hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

For example, Atos OneCloud Sovereign Shield can be deployed to a private disconnected cloud that is adapted to clients’ requirements to ensure data segregation in a specific jurisdictional or local public cloud that limits access to users from outside that area and on a global public cloud with sovereign controls.

Sovereign Shield’s optimized framework includes proprietary technological building blocks, including Atos’ BullSequana Edge servers, Trustway encryption solutions, Evidian Identity and Access Management software, IDnomic Trusted Identities, the company’s Managed Detection and Response cybersecurity monitoring services and a roster of trusted third parties. These proprietary products leverage Atos’ expertise in open-source software.

Atos synergizes these technologies with a network of strategic partners and local experts in various geographical regions who can provide essential insights to ensure control, processing and jurisdictional alignment of data. These partnerships are in development, and Atos will announce them when they are landed.

Along with local expertise, Atos is bringing trusted global partners on board to ensure public cloud access, connectivity and vendor choice across jurisdictions. These partners include Google GCP, Amazon AWS, Microsoft Azure, OVHcloud, VMWare and Red Hat. Atos is working on expanding its global partnerships, with more announcements anticipated in the near future.

The Sovereign Shield platform will ensure that data, including data in transit from edge to cloud, is managed with full security and auditability according to customers’ sovereignty requirements. It will also ensure that data is managed according to future industry standards, including the European Cybersecurity Scheme (ENISA) certification framework and Gaia-X Association labels.

As a result, Atos’ platform will significantly boost efforts to ensure territorial jurisdiction so that customers’ data is processed and operated locally in full compliance with existing local regulations—wherever that “local” may be. Customers will also be able to define the exact location, nationality and accreditation of its data operators.

“Atos OneCloud Sovereign Shield was born out of our experience supporting governments and large organizations across Europe, where there is a fast-growing need for greater control and protection of data, data exchange and infrastructure, in line with national and international requirements,” said Pierre Barnabé, Atos interim co-CEO and head of Big Data and Security. “I’m excited that Atos is now able to meet those requirements with our Atos OneCloud Sovereign Shield, working hand-in-hand with all leading cloud providers and integrating Atos’ proprietary solutions to provide the most flexible and responsive sovereign offering available and as such unique on the market.”

Meeting the sovereignty requirements of clients across many borders, sectors and industries presents a formidable challenge. Sovereign Shield provides solutions to meet those complex requirements.

The platform helps ensure sovereignty on data access, storage, movement and use by bringing best-practice guidance on data segregation and processing, tailored to the location. Atos’ security services and products ensure that all data, including data transitioning from edge to cloud, is protected and used according to each client’s specific policy. This includes data from regulated industries, which can require exceptionally high levels of control. In fact, Atos is developing a version of OneCloud Sovereign Shield for the defense industry in a separate and enhanced version.

Atos is taking steps to ensure its solutions can respond to future developments. The company is working on next-generation sovereignty technologies, such as post-quantum cryptography and homomorphic encryption, and with commercial and academic collaborators to develop market-ready homomorphic encryption solutions.

Sovereign Shield also makes sure that client data stays in full compliance with local existing regulations. By enabling clients to define jurisdictions for compliance, Atos ensures that its customers have a clear picture of where their data and information technology are hosted, which laws govern access to the data and any potential risks that exist in those jurisdictions.

“To meet our challenges of domestic growth, international business expansion and data sovereignty, we have defined a strategy leveraging the best combination of private and public cloud,” said Xavier Etienne, executive vice president Technology & International of FDJ, Europe’s second-largest lottery. The regulated gaming sector can require very high levels of data protection and jurisdictional compliance. “Atos supports us in this definition while providing the right set of services to analyze data segregation and security requirement in order to select appropriate solutions with the right sovereignty approach. With Atos and its partners, we appreciate the range of choices that meet differentiated needs, local and international, making it possible to conciliate sovereignty and competitiveness.”

There is a growing number of demands by policymakers and businesses for a transparent, rules-based system that allows for enhanced ownership of data and technology assets, with the European Union at the forefront. As individuals and businesses continue to generate more and more data, those demands will likely increase. Atos’ Sovereignty Shield platform addresses the increasing complexity of what to do with data as it moves across jurisdictions that often have different laws and requirements that businesses need to comply with.

Atos is a global leader in cutting-edge technologies. Read more about the company’s products and offerings at Atos to Strengthen Its Digital Manufacturing and PLM Capabilities with the Acquisition of Processia.