Editorial:

This week has shown one thing above all: Digital sovereignty is not a strategy paper, but everyday work.

Politically, there is much talk of unity—in Saarland, in the federal government, in Europe. Practically, people often stick to what is “proven.” At the same time, examples like Bavaria with Visavid or the Opendesk pilots show: Technically, the transition is already possible. It is rarely a lack of software, almost always a lack of consistency.

This becomes particularly clear where employees resort to shadow IT due to time pressure. This is not misconduct, but a signal: If official systems are slower than Dropbox & Co., they automatically lose.

Digital sovereignty does not mean isolation, but control, freedom of choice, and interchangeability. Those who want it must build it in operations—not just in guidelines.

Welcome to the Weekly Backlog.

Tech-News:

Open Source? Yes, but please without change

In the Saarland state parliament, there is rare unity: They want to gradually move away from US software like Microsoft, ideally across Europe. Digital sovereignty, reducing dependencies, all correct. Yet, the state government remains calm—an open-source strategy is not planned, Microsoft remains set.

The reasoning is disarmingly honest: The existing office solutions are functional, secure, and above all “widely accepted.” Translated, this means: People are used to it. That habit is not a sustainable IT concept seems to be of secondary importance—as well as rising license costs, legal uncertainties due to US access rights, or the actual vendor lock-in.

Meanwhile, open source is already everyday life. From LibreOffice to European cloud stacks to joint development platforms like OpenCode, the technology is available and tested. Training effort is manageable, dependencies are not. Other federal states show that a gradual transition is possible—not seamless, but real.

Opensaar e.V. sums it up: Open source is not the risk but the prerequisite for digital sovereignty. Now it will be shown whether political commitments become more than the good feeling of being on the right side.

🔗 Worth reading: https://www.sr.de/sr/home/nachrichten/politik_wirtschaft/us_it_in_saar-verwaltung_100.html

Digital sovereignty is not a buzzword

The guest article on cloudcomputing-insider.de by Dmytro Tereshchenko, CISO of Sigma Software Group, dispels European self-deceptions. His core thesis is clear and uncomfortable:

“Europe talks about digital independence as if it were a goal for the future. In reality, it’s about survival.”

Despite data centers, strategies, and regulation, over 80 percent of digital products and services in Europe depend on non-European providers. Data resides in US clouds, innovation stacks are under foreign control. This is not a theoretical debate but a structural risk—economically and geopolitically.

Tereshchenko’s distinction is apt: Sovereignty means setting rules, independence means being able to act. Without operational resilience, both remain illusions. Or as he puts it:

“Strategic autonomy without operational resilience is a fragile fantasy.”

The text makes it clear: Digital sovereignty is not a firewall and not a cloud label. It means freedom of choice, interchangeability, and control—and requires decisions that can be more uncomfortable and expensive than the next hyperscaler deal.

In short: Europe’s problem is not a lack of insight, but a lack of consistency.

🔗 Worth reading: https://www.cloudcomputing-insider.de/digitale-souveraenitaet-europa-neudefinition-a-c493585bb6ddef438dd5b8c6ccd76c47/

Starlink as a strategic factor in the Ukraine war

The article from Business Punk describes a technically and geopolitically remarkable event: SpaceX has restricted the illegal use of Starlink by Russian troops—not by a shutdown, but by a software-based speed limit of 90 km/h. Irrelevant for civilian use, but a significant cut for military drone control.

Russian units had acquired Starlink terminals through unofficial channels and used them for communication and drone operations for years. With the new regulation, drones lose connection at higher speeds, making them practically uncontrollable. Reports indicate that this led to disruptions in Russian troop command and the use of reconnaissance and attack drones.

The case shows how modern military operations depend on commercial technology. Starlink is not a state system but a privately operated infrastructure whose usage conditions are set by SpaceX. Changes at the software level can thus have immediate operational impacts.

In parallel with the technical restriction, the registration of all Starlink terminals by the Ukrainian military was introduced. The previously existing gray area in the use of the hardware seems to have ended. Observers assume that political agreements between SpaceX, Ukraine, and US authorities preceded this step.

Regardless of the specific evaluation, the event makes it clear that satellite communication, cloud services, and other digital platforms have become security-relevant factors. Control over such systems influences not only economic processes but increasingly also military capabilities.

🔗 Worth reading: https://www.business-punk.com/tech/musk-dreht-russland-den-saft-ab-mit-90-km-h-trick/#google_vignette

Digital sovereignty: Germany’s long road away from US software

The report from Golem.de shows that the topic of digital sovereignty in Germany is moving from debate to implementation—but in small, cautious steps. One trigger is the EU consultation on open source, which saw an unusually high participation with 1,658 submissions. Companies, associations, and developers made it clear that dependencies on proprietary US software are increasingly perceived as a strategic risk.

At the federal level, the topic is now becoming concrete. With Opendesk, the federal government is testing a fully open-source-based workplace suite, developed at the Center for Digital Sovereignty (Zendis). Initial pilot projects are underway, and further rollouts in federal and state authorities are planned. Experiences from Schleswig-Holstein, which is considered a pioneer in the use of free software, are being incorporated.

The focus is initially on collaboration software: Sharepoint and Exchange functions are to be gradually replaced by open-source alternatives. In virtualization and cloud infrastructure, the federal government is also examining alternatives to established US providers, but refers to the BSI’s security policy dual strategy and the legal risks posed by the US Cloud Act.

The article makes it clear: Germany is moving, but slowly. There can be no talk of a comprehensive departure from US software yet. Digital sovereignty is understood more as an evolutionary process—a controlled transformation rather than a radical realignment.

🔗 Worth reading: https://www.golem.de/news/digitale-souveraenitaet-wie-deutschland-sich-von-us-software-loest-2602-205092.html

Digital sovereignty requires cooperation

The LinkedIn post by the Bundesdruckerei Group brings an important point to the table: Digital sovereignty is not an isolated technology project, but a cooperation between state, economy, and society. Given that, according to Bitkom, 69% of companies source digital services and technologies from abroad, the question is less whether dependencies exist—but how to handle them responsibly.

Helpful is the clear structure along the Cloud Sovereignty Framework of the EU Commission. The “Sovereignty Objectives” defined there can be sensibly broken down into four pillars: Jurisdiction & Governance, technical, operational, and data sovereignty. This brings order to a debate that otherwise quickly swings between ideology, marketing, and wishful thinking.

Particularly relevant for public administration is the pragmatic definition: Digital sovereignty does not mean isolation, but control, freedom of choice, and reversibility. Or put differently: Only those who can control processes, data flows, and technologies themselves remain capable of acting—legally and operationally.

The accompanying contribution by the Bundesdruckerei Group neatly categorizes this. Digital sovereignty is explicitly described there as a continuous process, not as an end state. Open standards, open source, European cloud infrastructures, strong digital identities, and future-proof encryption (including post-quantum cryptography) are identified as central building blocks. At the same time, it is acknowledged that complete independence is neither realistic nor sensible.

Also noteworthy is the focus on collaboration: The economy provides auditable, interoperable solutions, science and standardization ensure future viability, and civil society ensures control and trust. It is precisely this cooperation that determines whether digital sovereignty becomes more than a political guiding principle.

In short: The contribution sets a refreshingly sober tone in an often overheated debate. Digital sovereignty does not arise from origin labels, but from architecture, governance, and long-term responsibility. We expressly welcome this.

🔗 More on this: https://www.bundesdruckerei.de/de/innovation-hub/digitale-souveraenitaet-was-ist-das

Blog Post:

Shadow IT in the Town Hall

In the blog post “Shadow IT in the Town Hall”, David Hussain describes why employees in administrations resort to Dropbox, WeTransfer, or WhatsApp out of frustration and time pressure—and why this is not a disciplinary problem, but a structural IT failure. Shadow IT, he argues, is the symptom of a usability and process gap between secure government IT and real everyday work.

The post explains why bans exacerbate the situation, how “consumer experience expectations” arise, and why digital sovereignty only works if official solutions are faster, simpler, and more practical than their shadow alternatives. Hussain does not remain abstract but makes concrete suggestions—from open-source toolchains to automation to federated communication standards.

A worthwhile read for anyone who no longer wants to fight shadow IT but wants to make it superfluous.

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Good-News:

Visavid remains – Good news from Bavaria

While other federal states are still debating whether to become more independent from US software, Bavaria simply decides—and extends the contract for its video conferencing system Visavid until potentially 2038. Developed by Auctores, operated with OVHcloud, hosted in the EEA. No buzzwords, just a clear architectural decision.

Visavid has been running in the BayernCloud school since 2021 and is now being further developed as ViKo26: scalable up to a hundred thousand parallel conferences, millions of users, GDPR-compliant.