AWS Introduces European Sovereign Cloud
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AWS has previewed the European Sovereign Cloud, an upcoming network of data centers that will be used by government agencies and highly regulated enterprises in the European Union.
As per the Amazon.com unit, the European Sovereign Cloud will be operated by EU-resident employees. Existing AWS customers will have to open new cloud accounts to use the infrastructure.
AWS’ European Sovereign Cloud is designed to help organizations more easily comply with EU data regulations. The platform will allow customers to keep all their metadata within the bloc. This metadata consists of technical information about customers’ cloud environments.
The European Sovereign Cloud will use separate billing and usage tracking systems from AWS’ standard cloud data centers.
The first European Sovereign Cloud region is set to launch in Germany. It will include multiple availability zones. The data centers that make up an AWS region are deployed in different locations with separate power and cooling systems, which means a localized outage at one facility is unlikely to affect the others.
The European Sovereign Cloud will provide access to AWS Outposts that allows customers to deploy AWS infrastructure at their own data centers. This arrangement makes it possible to run applications closer to users than would otherwise be otherwise possible, which reduces network latency.
The European Sovereign Cloud will also support a related offering called AWS Dedicated Local Zones. Similarly to Outposts, the offers to deploy cloud infrastructure at their own facilities. Dedicated local zones are managed by AWS.
AWS already offers a service similar to the European Sovereign Cloud in the U.S. Known as GovCloud, it provides access to data centers built specifically for use by public sector customers. Those data centers operate separately from AWS’ standard cloud facilities.
AWS rival Microsoft. is also making efforts to support highly regulated customers. Earlier this year, it launched an initiative called the EU Data Boundary. The initiative will enable customers such as government agencies to keep information they generate in Microsoft 365, Azure, and other other services on EU-based infrastructure.
