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Trump is back — and with him, the risk that the U.S. could unplug Europe from the digital world.

Donald Trump’s return to the White House is forcing Europe to reckon with a major digital vulnerability: The U.S. holds a kill switch over its internet.

As the U.S. administration raises the stakes in a geopolitical poker game that began when Trump started his trade war, Europeans are waking up to the fact that years of over-reliance on a handful of U.S. tech giants have given Washington a winning hand.

The fatal vulnerability is Europe’s near-total dependency on U.S. cloud providers.

Cloud computing is the lifeblood of the internet, powering everything from the emails we send and videos we stream to industrial data processing and government communications. Just three American behemoths — Amazon, Microsoft, and Google — hold more than two-thirds of the regional market, putting Europe’s online existence in the hands of firms cozying up to the U.S. president to fend off looming regulations and fines.

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[-] disguy_ovahea@lemmy.world 176 points 5 days ago

This sounds a lot like, “build your own servers and topple another US industry.”

[-] DrBob@lemmy.ca 78 points 5 days ago

Another short-term decision by America could lead to more long-term loss of wealth and influence.

[-] Rhaedas@fedia.io 10 points 5 days ago

"Stop shooting ourselves in the feet!"

So many decisions being made are very isolationist, and that never works well for the one shutting everyone else out. But who looks at history, right?

[-] Truscape 20 points 5 days ago

Honestly, as an American living in Silicon Valley, I would be overjoyed if Europe became the primary kickstarter for open source alternatives to the existing US corporate infrastructure, that bends to the knees of the Federal government. Even here at home, myself and some of my co-workers aren't too keen on the existing status quo tools because there are too many caveats - from rent seeking subscriptions to the inability to verify if something is tampered with.

In the same way Valve saw how having all their eggs in the Windows basket led them to dive head first into linux development, I hope the EU's realization of the risks in the US tech sector lead it to developing unified, well funded OSS alternatives. I would certainly install them.

[-] MeThisGuy@feddit.nl 4 points 4 days ago

as a European formerly living in silicon valley.. we are working on it. and thanks to the orange turd in charge it's been fast-tracked. and when all hell breaks loose, we'll just stop sending ASML machines your way. best of luck idiots (not all of you)

[-] Truscape 1 points 4 days ago

Hey, just put the word out for my work visa, please! XD

[-] MeThisGuy@feddit.nl 2 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

they're expanding, so most likely hiring. the world can't get enough of the 2 nm chips (not much more smaller after that for probably a decade).
they're building machines as fast as they can. I'm a CNC machinist and have made plenty of parts for them and have friends that assemble cleanroom parts for them.
plenty of work to go around.
you don't even need to speak Dutch there, English is fine.
and guess what? we even have great public transportation.
come one come all, apply today!
and get away from that hellhole the US has become. it used to be us (one for all, all for one), now it's just them the elite.
I lived there 24 yrs, from the golden age of silicon valley (late 90s) to its inevitable enshittification. glad I got out before it's demise.

[-] Truscape 2 points 4 days ago

I'm currently hosed by the fact that I am in the middle of completing my Electrical Engineeing degree (approx. 2 years left), and I don't believe my credits would be transferable to an institution across the Atlantic (never mind the cost, shudder), so I can't even think about escaping until at least 2027.

If there's a better way forward so I can safely leave the nation and still achieve my degree, I'm all ears, but at least to me it seems my hands are a bit tied.

[-] MeThisGuy@feddit.nl 1 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

I'm not too knowledgable about schooling and transfer credits but I would def send a letter (or email) to ASML describing your current school (perhaps not political) situation and who knows, maybe they pay for the whole ride. paid learning is a thing here.
I believe as well visas for critical jobs. doesn't hurt to ask

[-] r_deckard@lemmy.world 54 points 4 days ago

Talk about clickbait ...... Article title: trump can pull the plug on the internet and europe can't do anything about it (my emphasis) First line: the U.S. could unplug Europe from the digital world (not "pull the plug on the internet") And then further down: "The fatal vulnerability is Europe’s near-total dependency on U.S. cloud providers."

So first, it's "the internet", then it's "unplug europe from the digital world", then it's "europe's dependency on US cloud providers"

So it's NOT "the internet", and it's NOT "unplug europe", it's disconnect european customers from US cloud providers.

Methinks Monseiur Pollet doesn't understand very much about the internet.

[-] Eximius@lemmy.world 9 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

It's even less of a thing. Things like AWS have datacenters in Europe, where most of Europe-side of traffic is hosted. Even if Trump made executive decisions to stop any internets companies doing business in Europe, it would have ZERO impact on the subsidy. Any cloud issues would really only impact "vertical scaling cloud-native" bullshit software, there are plenty and most reasonable companies are based on more sane (and less expensive) hosting solutions, which are in-house European.

Takes a massive fool to think European companies are basing their data in US continent, where the ping would be >150ms, and speeds would be far slower and less manageable.

[-] valkyrieangela 2 points 4 days ago

Takes a massive fool to think European companies are basing their data in US continent, where the ping would be >150ms, and speeds would be far slower and less manageable.

It's actually simpler than that: It's not in regulatory compliance. Cloud providers need to host their data centers in different regions because of geopolitical instability, including the distinct possibility of this scenario, among other localized regulatory factors. These companies may be headquartered in America but they still are at the whim of many different governments.

Source: I have an AWS certification

[-] AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world 7 points 4 days ago

Methinks Monseiur Pollet doesn't understand very much about the internet.

It's like tubes. With trucks in them. It's simple!

[-] dQw4w9WgXcQ@lemm.ee 7 points 4 days ago

But honestly, disconnection from the US cloud providers is a lot bigger than you seem to think. A ton of governmental services are hosted on US cloud providers. Pulling that plug would mean blackout for a crapload of governmental services, which we have grown to depend on.

[-] SloganLessons@lemmy.world 9 points 4 days ago

It would also mean a huge hit on their own tech sector, if not near wipeout.

It’s one of those situations that, sure, they could, just like a monkey could purposely snap the branch where he and his friend are sitting on and both fall.

As for Europe, yes, it would be a painful transition, but eventually it could build its own infrastructure anyway

[-] MeThisGuy@feddit.nl 5 points 4 days ago

eh, in the Netherlands we would just cut off all their datacenters, maybe even the internet hub we have to the US.
so go ahead

[-] Buffalox@lemmy.world 113 points 5 days ago

Misleading title. It's really about cloud services. And Europe is already working on making itself independent of American cloud services.

[-] Mothra@mander.xyz 15 points 5 days ago

Thanks for sparing me the clickbait

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[-] cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca 65 points 5 days ago

Ya ok but this isn't a doomsday thing, we used to build our own servers before and lots of people know how to do it still.

All AWS and the like do is remove the hardware for the consumer and add some APIs.

Doesn't sound as scary to me as the article paints. The only hard part would be the migration 😅

[-] squaresinger@lemmy.world 6 points 5 days ago

If the USA switches off cloud services for the EU, that's a short-term problem. Really bad short term, but after a month or so everything is back up and running.

[-] drmoose@lemmy.world 45 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Just some stupid doom bait.

If it would get to cable cutting between US and Europe then we have much bigger problems than slow web apps. If Europe would ever get to that it definitely has enough cloud providers for essential services. Around 90% of all bandwidth is entertainment.

[-] WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works 14 points 5 days ago

who said slow web apps. EU hosting providers could step in probably, but where is exactly all the data stored currently? even assuming that most orgs do proper, working backups, restoring them and setting up their systems for the new providers would still tame a lot of time

[-] pennomi@lemmy.world 31 points 5 days ago

All that would do is get Jeff Bezos to hire a hitman to take out Trump.

[-] Reverendender@sh.itjust.works 44 points 5 days ago

I’m not hearing a problem here

[-] dinren@discuss.online 6 points 5 days ago

I know an Italian guy who might be down

[-] JcbAzPx@lemmy.world 23 points 5 days ago

I'm pretty sure all three of those companies host server farms in Europe. I doubt they would give them up just to fluff Trump.

[-] CompactFlax@discuss.tchncs.de 7 points 4 days ago

MS pulled access to the azure environment of a (Russian owned) bank in NL and despite NL court orders asking for the data to be made accessible, it took diplomacy and a US court order to get access. This was not during trump admin.

We’ve been saying “this would never happen” and trump admin has slowly been shifting the Overton window.

[-] JcbAzPx@lemmy.world 1 points 4 days ago

In that case they didn't want to risk liability. They're not going to do something guaranteed to lose them lots of money just to make daddy Trump happy.

[-] vane@lemmy.world 16 points 4 days ago

I hope he will do it so EU politicians stop feeding foreign corporations with tax money.

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[-] nialv7@lemmy.world 21 points 5 days ago

I hope this means people finally start to see the danger of centralization.

[-] ScoffingLizard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 4 days ago

I can't convince a single person to get off Facebook and stop using Gmail.

[-] CriticalMiss@lemmy.world 10 points 4 days ago

Cloud computing can be replaced (albeit it’s a hard process, sorta like detox). Good luck starting an independent ICANN and DNS zones.

[-] barsoap@lemm.ee 9 points 4 days ago

It'd take some time to organise a replacement organisation but it's not like those systems collapse when the central service goes down. We do have our own root servers and the internet can survive a month or two of not being able to register new tlds or assign subnets.

On the flipside, I wonder how US multinationals would fare without SAP.

[-] JennyLaFae 2 points 4 days ago

I believe many EU nations are already divesting from US companies and products, both at governmental levels and citizen boycotts. I recently read one of the countries was switching their government's computers to linux/foss

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[-] Bwaz@lemmy.world 16 points 5 days ago

Time for EU to start a new web, WWWUS. World-Wide-Without-....

[-] victorz@lemmy.world 11 points 4 days ago

WWWEU.. Pronounced as "Wii U". 💅

[-] ArchmageAzor@lemmy.world 12 points 5 days ago

Our own internet without Americans? Where do I sign up?

[-] T00l_shed@lemmy.world 11 points 5 days ago

I mean, there are servers in European countries, couldn't they just nationalize the servers and continue as usual?

[-] lIlIlIlIlIlIl@lemmy.world 10 points 5 days ago

The servers would stop working the moment the US “pulls the plug.” Nationalization would not secure service, that would only secure non-functional hardware

[-] Branny@sh.itjust.works 14 points 5 days ago

The hardware is here. The entire hecking infrastructure is here. Making it work might not be as easy as flipping a switch, but it is definitely not impossible lol

[-] jlh@lemmy.jlh.name 3 points 5 days ago

would probably take a month or two

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[-] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 8 points 5 days ago

For one, servers running Amazon's ECS/EKS can switch to self-managed Kubernetes.

Even if Trump is bluffing as usual, European governments and local councils should get the hint that the tech hegemony Google Amazon Apple and Microsoft is going to be used as an arm of the US government.

Time to switch! Wololo

Richard stallman, Saint IGNUtias of the Church of Emacs

[-] ideonek@piefed.social 7 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Just three American behemoths — Amazon, Microsoft, and Google...

Do it! What are you waiting for? Do it!

[-] Randomgal@lemmy.ca 6 points 5 days ago

If we get tot get point Trump is cutting off the world's internet, I'd be more concerned about the nukes about to fly.

[-] cathfish@lemmy.world 4 points 5 days ago

Well. do it. We'll see.

[-] Switorik@lemmy.zip 4 points 5 days ago

Can we pull the plug on Trump already? I swear this timeline is a cruel joke.

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[-] lemmyknow@lemmy.today 3 points 5 days ago

What does this mean, exactly? Sounds like "Trump could end Europe's internet access", but I'm sure wise Lemmy experts could chime in to clarify this means "Trump could disconnect Europe from the US, internet-wise", which tbh don't sound that bad. Sure hoping it's the latter

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this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2025
253 points (100.0% liked)

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