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Can Switzerland Become a Safe Haven For the World's Data? (dailydot.com)

An anonymous reader shares an interesting article on Daily Dot which lists a number of reasons why Switzerland should be deemed as the nation for storing all of your data. The article reads: As United States and European Union regulators debate a sweeping new data-privacy agreement, Switzerland is presenting itself as a viable neutral location for storing the world's data thanks to strict privacy laws and ideal infrastructure. The Swiss constitution guarantees data privacy under Article 13. The country's laws protecting privacy are similar to those enacted by the E.U. Swiss data protections are also, in some cases, much stricter than those of the E.U., according to Nicola Benz, attorney at Swiss law firm Froriep. And since Switzerland is not part of the E.U., data stored there remains outside the reach of the union's authorities. [...] The country's tight privacy laws could make the small nation more attractive to privacy-focused start-ups. And it already has that momentum. After the former NSA contractor Edward Snowden 2013 revelations about the National Security Agency's secret surveillance activities, Switzerland witnessed something of a boom in its data-center business. Phil Zimmermann, creator of the popular PGP encryption protocol and founder of Silent Circle, even left the U.S. for Switzerland last year, citing the overreach of American authorities. Andy Yen, CEO of Swiss-based encrypted email service Protonmail, said that the country has robust processes in how it carries out data requests from authorities. Data requests have to go through a court like in most countries, said Yen, but "the person that's having their data requested needs to be notified eventually about the request happening and there's an opportunity to fight it in an open court. This is quite different than the U.S., where things can go through a so-called FISA court."

1 of 103 comments (clear)

  1. but of course. by nimbius · · Score: 0, Troll

    the country whos four major banks wound up in the panama papers is entirely trustworthy with the worlds data. the country with an open-ended sysiphean mission to question Julian assange about a rape that cant produce a victim is a mindful steward of privacy. The country whos historic purpose has been a tax haven for the worlds wealthy elite is also unaccountably a safe and neutral place to house data.

    Call me a skeptic, but unless sweden is a CNAME for a BSD machine on my network, I dont think so.

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