{"id":152762,"date":"2025-11-24T14:21:06","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T14:21:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/what-is-the-us-cloud-act-the-underestimated-risk-to-european-company-data-and-digital-sovereignty\/"},"modified":"2026-06-01T09:06:26","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T09:06:26","slug":"what-is-the-us-cloud-act-the-underestimated-risk-to-european-company-data-and-digital-sovereignty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/what-is-the-us-cloud-act-the-underestimated-risk-to-european-company-data-and-digital-sovereignty\/","title":{"rendered":"What is the US CLOUD Act? US access to EU data"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>The most important facts in brief<\/strong><\/p>\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <strong>US CLOUD Act (Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data Act)<\/strong> is a US federal law from 2018 that allows US authorities to request data from US cloud service providers &#8211; <strong>regardless of the storage location<\/strong>.<br\/><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>It is considered a <strong>strategic risk<\/strong> and a potential <strong>breach of the GDPR<\/strong>, as it deprives EU citizens and companies of effective legal protection.<br\/><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Sensitive documents such as <strong>legally valid contracts and personal proof of identity<\/strong> are particularly at risk, as they represent valuable business or personal assets.<br\/><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The secure strategic answer for companies is to consistently opt for <strong>European platforms and data storage locations<\/strong> that are exclusively subject to <strong>EU law<\/strong> (GDPR, eIDAS).<br\/><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>As a 100% European platform, sproof offers the necessary <strong>digital sovereignty<\/strong> and is therefore the risk-free alternative for your signature management.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The core of the problem: extraterritorial access<\/h2>\n\n<p>European companies are increasingly confronted with conflicts between US and EU law in a digital world. The <strong>US CLOUD Act<\/strong> (Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data Act), which came into force in 2018, is at the center of this dilemma. <\/p>\n\n<p>It authorizes US law enforcement authorities to request data from US cloud providers &#8211; such as Amazon, Microsoft or Google. The decisive, strategically relevant point is that these requests are <strong>independent of the geographical storage location<\/strong> of the data. Whether your digital contracts are located in Frankfurt, Dublin or Amsterdam is irrelevant from the perspective of the CLOUD Act, as long as the service provider is a US company.this creates a legal gray area, as US access potentially <strong>conflicts with the strict requirements of the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)<\/strong>.  <\/p>\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The CLOUD Act and the violation of the GDPR<\/h2>\n\n<p>The strategic risk is clear: the GDPR requires that personal data may only be transferred to or processed in third countries if an <strong>adequate level of protection<\/strong> (Art. 45 GDPR) is guaranteed.<\/p>\n\n<p>However, following the rulings of the European Court of Justice (ECJ, e.g. <strong>Schrems II<\/strong>), it was determined that US surveillance laws such as the CLOUD Act do not provide adequate protection for EU data.<\/p>\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table class=\"has-fixed-layout\"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Aspect<\/strong><\/td><td><strong>GDPR (EU law)<\/strong><\/td><td><strong>US CLOUD Act (US law)<\/strong><\/td><\/tr><tr><td><strong>Legitimation of access<\/strong><\/td><td>Court order in the EU, strong justification<\/td><td>US arrest warrant or subpoena, lower hurdles<\/td><\/tr><tr><td><strong>Notification<\/strong><\/td><td>Those affected must be informed<\/td><td>Provider may be subject to a duty of confidentiality (no notification)<\/td><\/tr><tr><td><strong>Territorial reach<\/strong><\/td><td>Restricted to EU territory<\/td><td><strong>Extraterritorial<\/strong>, applies worldwide to US providers<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n<p>In the case of a <strong>digital signature process<\/strong>, this concerns highly sensitive data: The contracts themselves, but also the <strong>proof of identity<\/strong> and the entire <strong>audit trail<\/strong> (signature protocol).<\/p>\n\n<p>Digital contracts and the underlying identity verification are <strong>your<\/strong> <strong>company<\/strong> <strong>&#8216;s<\/strong> <strong>most critical<\/strong> <strong>data assets<\/strong>. No compromise can be made here in terms of sovereignty. <\/p>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-media-text is-stacked-on-mobile has-background\" style=\"background-color:#f0f2f7\"><figure class=\"wp-block-media-text__media\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Cloud-Act-2025_transparent_DE-1024x768.png\" alt=\"Mockup WhitePaper Cloud Act sproof\" class=\"wp-image-2229 size-full\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Cloud-Act-2025_transparent_DE-1024x768.png 1024w, https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Cloud-Act-2025_transparent_DE-300x225.png 300w, https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Cloud-Act-2025_transparent_DE-768x576.png 768w, https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Cloud-Act-2025_transparent_DE-1536x1152.png 1536w, https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Cloud-Act-2025_transparent_DE-2048x1536.png 2048w, https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Cloud-Act-2025_transparent_DE-1200x900.png 1200w, https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Cloud-Act-2025_transparent_DE-600x450.png 600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure><div class=\"wp-block-media-text__content\">\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sproof.com\/paper\/white-paper-cloud-act\/https:\/\/www.sproof.com\/paper\/white-paper-cloud-act\/\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.sproof.com\/paper\/white-paper-cloud-act\/https:\/\/www.sproof.com\/paper\/white-paper-cloud-act\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Whitepaper: CLOUD Act vs. data protection: Why an EU cloud is becoming mandatory for secure contract processes \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The path to risk minimization: internal action<\/h2>\n\n<p>The solution for European companies is not just to be aware of the CLOUD Act, but to take action:<\/p>\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Identify critical workloads:<\/strong> Evaluate which data (contracts, HR files, IP documents) have a high need for protection.<br\/><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Choose a sovereign European infrastructure:<\/strong> Rely on European, eIDAS-compliant signature and hosting solutions for these critical areas.<br\/><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Secure access and identity management: <\/strong>Ensure that both access and digital identity verification for signature-relevant data remain under European control &#8211; for example through trust services regulated in Europe (eIDAS-compliant).<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Digital sovereignty: sproof as the European answer<\/h2>\n\n<p>The conflict surrounding the CLOUD Act highlights the need for Europe&#8217;s <strong>digital sovereignty<\/strong>. Companies must act proactively to make their data infrastructure immune to the access rights of third countries. <\/p>\n\n<p>sproof was developed as a European platform with precisely this strategic orientation. Our perspective is uncompromising: <\/p>\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>EU law exclusive:<\/strong> sproof solutions, including <strong>sproof Sign<\/strong>, <strong>sproof Ident<\/strong>, <strong>sproof Widget, sproof Fastlane, sproof eID Hub, sproof Validate<\/strong> are 100% developed in Europe and hosted on European servers. They are exclusively subject to the GDPR and eIDAS. <br\/><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>No CLOUD Act threat:<\/strong> Since sproof is not a US company and does not operate any US subsidiaries, US authorities cannot enforce access via the CLOUD Act.<br\/><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>eIDAS certification:<\/strong> Our services meet the highest European trust standards, in particular for the <strong>Qualified Electronic Signature (QES)<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n<p>This choice is not just a question of legal compliance, but a <strong>strategic competitive advantage<\/strong> that signals maximum trust to your customers and partners.<\/p>\n\n<p><strong>Protect your most critical data. Choose digital sovereignty. <\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sproof.com\/vertrieb\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Start your transition now to a 100% European signature platform that guarantees your compliance security \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The underestimated risk to European corporate data and digital sovereignty<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":154300,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[106],"tags":[1304,1310,1306,1313,1308,139,1311],"class_list":["post-152762","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-knowledge-post","tag-cloud-act","tag-digital-sovereignty","tag-esignature","tag-eu-cloud","tag-eu-law","tag-gdpr","tag-privacy-policy"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152762","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=152762"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152762\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":157979,"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152762\/revisions\/157979"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/154300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=152762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=152762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-staging.sproof.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=152762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}