Governments, telcos collaborate towards digital sovereignty

It is now a top priority for nations, experts say.

Digital resilience has become a critical focus for governments, which are working with telecommunications companies to safeguard technologies and data as part of national security.

"As geopolitical tensions rise and digital dependencies deepen, governments are rethinking how essential technologies are built, operated, and secured," said IBM Consulting's Rahul Kumar and Luq Niazi in an IBM thought piece on digital sovereignty, which is the ability to maintain control and governance over data and infrastructure.

"At the centre of this shift are telecommunications providers. Long seen as operators of connectivity, telcos are now emerging as architects of national digital resilience. They're increasingly responsible not just for keeping networks running, but for ensuring that economies retain control over the systems they depend on."

Digital sovereignty is being described as a top priority in terms of national security, with telcos seen as important partners for governments looking to be future-ready digitally.

"As governments intensify their focus on digital sovereignty, telco leaders are uniquely positioned to build a resilient foundation for national digital infrastructure and services," Kumar and Niazi pointed out.

"Telcos already run trusted networks across economies and societies and can use them to accelerate the adoption of advanced digital capabilities in infrastructure, data security, and AI (artificial intelligence).

"But this collaboration requires a different model. Telco leaders must now collaborate closely with governments and enterprises to define priorities such as who funds and operates key capabilities and where public investment is needed... they must also determine which services customers and enterprises will support commercially."

Kuwait, for instance, has undertaken a major digital infrastructure initiative through a 50-year public-private partnership with telco investor Beyon.

Meanwhile, intelligence platform GlobalData also considers digital sovereignty as a national security imperative.

Principal Analyst Isabel Al-Dhahir declared: "Digital sovereignty is no longer a niche policy ambition. It has become a strategic imperative for every nation.

"The combination of extraterritorial data laws, AI's insatiable appetite for data, and the growing geopolitical weaponisation of technology means that over-reliance on foreign digital infrastructure now carries the same risk profile as dependence on foreign energy supplies."

The statement comes following the release of GlobalData's "Digital Sovereignty" report, which cites the need for sovereign digital capabilities and strategies. In GlobalData's view, true national sovereignty depends as much on controlling digital infrastructure as it does on physical borders.