Finland’s statistics agency reconsiders US cloud services over political unpredictability

Finland’s national statistics office is reassessing its use of US-based cloud services due to concerns over political unpredictability in the United States, Yle reports.

Statistics Finland currently stores some of its background data in Microsoft’s cloud infrastructure, following government guidelines. However, only a fraction of its total data has been migrated so far.

Mikko Lindholm, the agency’s director-general, cited the unpredictability of the Trump administration as a key concern. While US law restricts authorities’ access to stored data, Lindholm noted that legal protections may not be enough.

“When the Trump administration has bent rules in multiple areas, it naturally raises doubts about how secure our data really is in a US cloud service,” he told Yle.

Despite these concerns, Statistics Finland still considers Microsoft’s cloud a viable option for most of its data. The agency has also prepared an exit strategy to repatriate Finnish data if risks materialise.

Geopolitical shifts have led the agency to adopt a more cautious approach. While larger-scale cloud migration was previously planned, Lindholm said personal data may now never be transferred to US servers. A government-run data centre remains an alternative storage option.