IT Sovereignty
Countries led by leading European countries and India with big markets are accelerating to lower their dependence on global internet giants such as Google and FaceBook. The utilization of the internet on the uptick is increasing demand for global internet companies’ innovation. But in proportion to growing demand, efforts are spreading to take information leadership.
According to the internet industry and major foreign news outlets, this year has seen a series of cases where Google and FaceBook were punished or their services were refused by the EU and India among other countries.
India scorned FaceBook’s free internet connection project in Februay and the launch of Google’s street view service. FaceBook is implementing a project to offer a free internet service by flying air balloons in developing countries with difficulties in connecting to the internet. But this internet service takes users to FaceBook websites only. With reference to the project, college professors in India insisted that the Indian government reject the service, pointing out a possibility of being controlled by FaceBook. The Indian government accepted their opinions.
In the case of the EU that does not have a search engine that can turn against Google, the EU is stepping up its efforts to protect their information sovereignty. EU member countries devoid of a search engine service that can rival Google prepared regulations that preclude Google from taking their people’s information out of their countries. They sealed a “privacy shield” deal with the US to debar US ICT firms from sending their data to the US. This means they built a legal supervision system to prevent Europeans’ data from being collected by US companies in bulk.
The same goes for private companies. Uber, a global car sharing company, began to create its own map service by investing US$ 500 million in order to become escape from the shadow of Google Map.
This is because Uber has to Uber-customized map service by lowering its dependence on Google Map since the company will have to compete with Google over self-driving service in the future. The two companies are having fierce competition to take the leadership collecting in information even though they are both American firms.
In Korea, experts say that this situation calls for Korea’s making countermeasures against the deepening of Korea’s dependence on global internet companies. Fortunately, Korea is not a serious level as Korean companies such as Naver and Kakao are taking the lead in competition with Google. But Korea cannot feel totally secure since the Android mobile phone system is exercising a monopoly in Korea, they say.
Moreover, recently Google demanded the use of a precise Korean map essential to mobile service, provoking a duel between industrial innovation and national security concerns. With regard to this, the experts insist that the Korean government set clear standards on it.
“Under the current circumstances, the Korean government does not have any means to manage and supervise Korean data sent abroad,” said Sohn Young-taek, director of the Spatial Information Technology Research Center. “Detailed data on individual users’ locations and private information can fall in the hands of foreign companies. So, Korea should make regulations on data management and screening like the EU.”