Austria’s military has completed a major IT overhaul, replacing Microsoft Office with the open-source LibreOffice suite across all its desktop systems. The change, finalized this month, affects approximately 16,000 workstations in the Austrian Armed Forces.
This move will substantially reduce Austria’s software bill. At $33.75 per user per month, a Microsoft 365 E3 subscription for 16,000 workstations costs approximately $6,480,000 per year, compared to LibreOffice’s zero cost.
Also: 4 reasons why LibreOffice downloads are way up (hint: you’ll relate)
But this move isn’t about saving money. The real motivation is to gain digital sovereignty and control over critical data. As Michael Hillebrand of Directorate 6 information and communications technology (ICT) and Cyber Defense, explained: “It was very important for us to show that we are doing this primarily to strengthen our digital sovereignty, to maintain our independence in terms of ICT infrastructure and to ensure that data is only processed in-house.”
Austria has plenty of company
This concern is not unique to Austria. Many EU governments are dumping Microsoft to protect their data. The German state of Schleswig-Holstein is replacing all Microsoft software with Linux and LibreOffice in government offices.
Austria’s move comes shortly after Danish officials said they’d be leaving Microsoft behind for the same reasons. The French city of Lyon is also moving to Linux and LibreOffice from Windows and Office to protect its citizens’ data.
Recently, digital sovereignty has become a contentious issue for countries outside the US that have been relying on American companies. Many European governments no longer trust their data or software to US-based companies under President Donald Trump.
They fear their data could be read or that Microsoft could kill their services on Trump’s behalf. While Microsoft chairman and general counsel Brad Smith dismissed such concerns and promised that the company would stand behind its EU customers against political pressure, others don’t trust Microsoft.
Their concerns will only be inflamed now that The Guardian reports that Microsoft has cut off Israel’s access to Azure, which the nation had been using to store data for a Palestinian surveillance system. While some people may support this decision, it also serves as a sharp warning that US companies can and will cut IT resources from their customers for political reasons.
In Austria’s case, the government started to worry that such moves were forthcoming when, in 2020, the military identified the risks of dependency on external cloud services, particularly those from the US. Austria wasn’t the only one. The German Interior Ministry warned in 2019 that Germany had become overly dependent on Microsoft software.
[…]
Source: This European military just ditched Microsoft for open-source LibreOffice – here’s why | ZDNET
It’s incredible that only some EU countries are waking up now, with Trump at the helm. The problem has always been there, despite GDPR arrangements. The US government has always had backdoor access to data stored in US cloud companies servers. None of these companies can guarantee that the data will be kept in EU clusters and even if they could, the US government installs secret backdoors in systems without the companies managements knowledge.
So by paying the US companies, not only are EU governments and militaries funding a dependancy on US software but also giving them all the knowledge and secrets they have on a platter. And for some reason, EU governments have been too stupid too see this.
Robin Edgar
Organisational Structures | Technology and Science | Military, IT and Lifestyle consultancy | Social, Broadcast & Cross Media | Flying aircraft