Microsoft will let Europeans choose from January whether they want to store data in the EU

Microsoft will begin rolling out the EU Data Boundary on January 1. This allows commercial and public organizations to have their data processed in the EU. The company will start with customer data from its cloud services, and other data will be added later.

From next year users can choose to no longer allow their customer data from the cloud services Microsoft 365, Azure, Power Platform and Dynamics 365 to enter the European Union and the European Free Trade Association leave. This means that this data is processed and stored in a European data center. According to the tech giant As a result, the majority of users’ personal data fall under the EU data limit.

Other types of data should be addressed in the next phases, Microsoft claims. The second phase involves ‘pseudonymised data’, such as log data. This phase should take place at the end of 2023. The third and final phase will be in 2024 and will involve data collected by the company from users during conversations with customer service.

Microsoft comes with its EU Data Boundary solution in response to the GDPR rules of the European Union. Personal data may be processed outside Europe, but only under certain conditions. For example, companies may only export data if they can guarantee that it is just as well protected abroad as it is in Europe. Microsoft claims that the company is already compliant with these guidelines, but that this solution enables business customers and consumers to better understand where their data is stored. Microsoft has more than seventeen data centers in Europe in which it can store and process customer data.