- 8 in 10 Europeans say they do not trust the handling of data from the United States or China
- Europeans are more likely to trust their own government than foreign companies
- The desire to find local alternatives is increasing
More than 8 in 10 Europeans do not trust American or Chinese tech companies to handle their data properly, according to a new study political This has been discovered by the European Pulsepoll survey.
European distrust of Chinese technology and companies is long-standing, largely due to fears that the Chinese government could force companies to hand over user data for nefarious purposes.
But the same sentiment has grown toward American tech companies, leading Europeans to look for domestic alternatives to the software typically dominated by American companies.
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Europe longs for local technology
The survey, which surveyed citizens from Germany, France, Spain, Belgium, Italy and Poland, found that 84% of respondents do not trust American tech companies to responsibly handle their data, and the figure rises to 93% when asked the same about Chinese tech companies.
When it comes to national trust, 45% of respondents said they trust their own national government with their data, and just over half (51%) said they trust European tech companies to handle their data responsibly. Belgians were the most likely to trust European companies: 59% believed that EU companies would handle their data responsibly.
Those most distrustful of foreign technology companies were German ones: 91 distrusted American companies and 98% distrusted Chinese companies. On the other hand, Poles trusted American companies (38%) and Chinese companies (20%) the most.
The European Union (EU) fiercely protects your data. The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) imposes strict rules on how companies handle European user data, even those based outside the EU. Companies handling European data that violate GDPR rules can face heavy fines, and refusal to pay can lead to legal action and operational bans.
The protections are so strong that President Donald Trump has called EU regulations “a form of taxation.” Trump recently ordered US diplomats to lobby against data regulations, including the GDPR, and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the GDPR regulations “unnecessarily burdensome data processing restrictions and cross-border data flow requirements” in an internal diplomatic cable.
The EU has acknowledged that some aspects of its data protection regulations, including the GDPR, have somewhat hampered European competitiveness and innovation in AI with proposals to relax regulations. On the other hand, European regulations remain much stricter than those in force in the United States and China, whose authorities can force companies to hand over user data.
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