Europe and the U.S. are frequently at odds with the second Trump administration, but governments and companies there are heavily dependent on U.S. technology. France announced plans to switch from Microsoft Windows to Linux as part of a shift toward European digital services. The transition is already underway, the government says.
"Digital sovereignty is not an option," said Minister of Action and Public Accounts David Amiel.
The State can no longer simply note its dependence, it must get out of it. We must desensitize ourselves from American tools and regain control of our digital destiny. We can no longer accept that our data, our infrastructures and our strategic decisions depend on solutions whose rules, prices, developments and risks we have no control over. The transition is underway: our ministries, our operators and our industrial partners are today embarking on an unprecedented approach to map our dependencies and strengthen our digital sovereignty.
Of all the things Trump has done since returning to office (threatening Danish sovereignty in Greenland, assassinating and capturing world leaders, threatening to leave NATO) one in particular appears to have gotten Europe moving on digital independence: U.S. tech giants participating in sanctioning judges on the International Criminal Court. The ICC imediately announced it would cease use of Microsoft Office and switch to European open-source alternative, citing the risk of weaponized U.S. tech.
France gave no timeline for its transition, first happening at DINUM, the French government's digital agency, and didn't even announce a distro. But it's not its first move away from U.S. tech: it quit Microsoft Teams for French-made Visio last year and said it would move its health data to a new platform by the end of 2026. The European Parliament also recently voted to reduce its reliance on foreign providers. Constrast with the government of Keir Starmer in the U.K., still announcing contracts with big tech companies, asking AI startups to set up shop there, and ignoring even the most ominous signs.
