The Decibel AI and digital sovereignty in the ‘elbows up’ era
Oct 20, 2025
Joe Castaldo, a Globe business reporter focused on AI and digital infrastructure, teams up with Pippa Norman, an innovation reporter examining technology's societal impacts. They delve into the complexities of Canadian digital sovereignty, exploring the implications for data security and the economy. Topics include the challenges of building sovereign cloud infrastructure, the potential economic opportunities, and the need for Canadian companies to step up. They also discuss how sovereignty can coexist with foreign partnerships, painting a nuanced picture of this pressing issue.
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What Digital Sovereignty Encompasses
- Digital sovereignty covers physical infrastructure like data centers and the legal control over data held within them.
- Canada faces the challenge of balancing national control with inevitable foreign company involvement.
Which Data Needs Sovereignty Most
- Sovereign systems could protect both personal and sensitive institutional data held by government bodies.
- Departments like healthcare and the military are likely priorities for heightened sovereignty.
Sovereignty Is Multi-Layered
- Sovereignty has multiple layers: data center location, ownership, employee location, customer location, and hardware provenance.
- Each layer affects how sovereign a company or service truly is and complicates defining 'sovereign.'