Observe ZDNET: Add us as a most popular supply on Google.
ZDNET’s key takeaways
- France is dropping US videoconferencing companies in favor of its personal open-source program.
- Visio is being deployed now and can exchange different companies by 2027.
- Visio is a part of a a lot bigger EU transfer to digital sovereignty.
It isn’t in regards to the French authorities not trusting US tech firms… Sorry, truly, it’s. It is all about France not trusting American firms with its information or companies.
As David Amiel, France’s minister-delegate for the civil service and state reform, put it: France is dedicated “to regaining our digital independence. We can not threat having our scientific exchanges, our delicate information, and our strategic improvements uncovered to non-European actors.”
Additionally: Europe’s plan to ditch US tech giants is constructed on open supply – and it is gaining steam
So, France is pushing US tech giants out of the French authorities. They’re shifting civil servants off Microsoft Groups and Zoom and onto a homegrown videoconferencing platform known as Visio — all within the identify of sovereign management over its digital infrastructure.
Paris has framed the choice as a strategic break from dependence on American cloud and collaboration platforms. The French authorities is explicitly linking it to a broader doctrine of “digital sovereignty.” This EU-based motion, which has been round for over a decade, is devoted to the proposition that EU international locations ought to depend on native EU tech firms, cloud companies, and platforms.
Non‑European platforms won’t be renewed
EU officers argue that counting on US-hosted companies exposes authorities discussions to international legal guidelines, such because the 2018 US Cloud Act, which authorizes the US authorities to entry information even when servers are situated on European soil.
Transferring to the sensible particulars, underneath the brand new videoconferencing plan, the MIT-licensed, open-source Visio can be rolled out throughout all ministries and state businesses, turning into the default and finally the unique videoconferencing instrument for French authorities employees. Visio has no relationship to the Microsoft diagramming and flowcharting program of the identical identify.
Additionally: Why folks preserve flocking to Linux (and it isn’t simply to flee Home windows)
Transferring ahead, licences for Zoom, Microsoft Groups, Google Meet, Webex, GoToMeeting, and all different non‑European platforms won’t be renewed as departments migrate, with full deployment focused by 2027.
France’s Interministerial Directorate for Digital Affairs (DINUM) developed Visio as a sovereign videoconferencing platform for the French state. The Netherlands and Germany have additionally helped with its growth. This system was constructed utilizing Django, the open-source Python internet framework; React, the JavaScript library for constructing consumer interfaces (UIs); and LiveKit, a scalable video conferencing system. Visio affords options equivalent to HD video calls, display screen sharing, and chat.
It has been examined for a few yr and already has roughly 40,000 common customers, with an enlargement path to some 200,000 employees within the close to time period.
Additionally: Why even a US tech big is launching ‘sovereign help’ for Europe now
Visio is a part of a broader Suite Numérique venture, a household of open-source sovereign software program applications designed to interchange US companies equivalent to Gmail, Slack, and different collaboration instruments at present utilized by the French administration. As a contemporary conferencing product, Visio affords AI‑powered transcription and speaker identification, constructed with know-how from French begin‑up Pyannote, and integrates with current safe messaging methods like Tchap, which runs on the Matrix protocol.
Officers stated the software program stack was developed with help from France’s cybersecurity company ANSSI to harden encryption and meet nationwide safety necessities.
France is making this transfer not solely to help digital sovereignty and enhance safety. The Élysée can be promoting the swap to economize and stimulate native business. Authorities estimates recommend that discontinuing exterior videoconferencing licences may save round 1 million euros per yr for each 100,000 customers who transfer to Visio. The transfer aligns carefully with an EU‑stage push to cut back reliance on dominant US cloud and software program distributors; the European Parliament just lately adopted resolutions urging extra management over vital digital infrastructure and AI platforms.
When digital sovereignty turns into coverage
France’s pivot lands at a time of heightened transatlantic rigidity over information safety, antitrust, and industrial coverage. It additionally sends a transparent sign that at the least one main EU state is, on the highest stage, prepared to enshrine digital sovereignty as coverage quite than a distant aspiration. Many different EU entities — together with an Austrian ministry, the Austrian navy, the German state of Schleswig-Holstein, Danish authorities organizations, and the French metropolis of Lyon — are dropping Microsoft applications in favor of homegrown European options.
Additionally: German state replaces Microsoft Alternate and Outlook with open-source e-mail
Not everybody in Europe is passionate about digital sovereignty. Börje Ekholm, CEO of Swedish telecom tools agency Ericsson, just lately stated at Davos that latest European discussions round sovereignty are “harmful,” and that makes an attempt to construct homegrown options to US know-how would result in larger costs within the area.
Be that as it could, if Visio can match the usability and uptime of US firms whereas preserving information inside European authorized jurisdiction, Paris could have created a template for different international locations searching for to maneuver away from reliance on American know-how.
