In the
Post–Cold War era, the concept of technological sovereignty has gained popularity due to a number of world events highlighting the vulnerability of technological dependence. In 1964, Pierre Cognard of France's wrote "Certainly it would be absurd to systematically oppose oneself to the introduction into a country of a foreign firm which brings in a superior technology and thus contributes to economic progress.… Nevertheless, we do not see how a Nation could maintain its political independence if such penetration becomes generalized."
Surveillance concerns Following revelations by
Edward Snowden in 2013 about the activities of the
United States'
National Security Agency and their
PRISM surveillance programme, rising concerns about misuse of data led to various proposals to enable citizens and consumers outside of the US to enjoy protection through technological sovereignty.
COVID-19 pandemic Supply chain disruptions during the
COVID-19 pandemic served as a wake-up call for nations to decrease their dependence on oversea supply chains as factory closures, transportation disruptions and export controls all contributed to unavailability of important imports. Meanwhile, countries that did have adequate supplies limited exports of those supplies.
Sanctions and economic concerns US sanctions against China as well as the
Made in China 2025 policy have accelerated the desire for technological sovereignty for China and the United States, but also for other economic blocks. In October 2020, the
White House Office of Science and Technology Policy released the National Strategy for Critical and Emerging Technologies, to advance US "technological competitiveness and national security." Technological sovereignty is also pursued by Russia. Especially after finding itself
sanctioned by many countries following the
annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the
invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia started a strategy of
import substitution.
Open source software The German government established the
Sovereign Tech Agency in 2022 to fund
open source software projects.
Cloud services and AI Following the
2025 United States tariffs against the European Union, fear of overreliance on US cloud providers such as Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace increased. According to
Nextcloud, one of the one of the foremost alternatives to replace them, during the first five months of 2025, customer interest in the software had tripled. Some governmental organisations including the
European Data Protection Supervisor and the German state of
Schleswig-Holstein have since switched from Microsoft's Sharepoint to Nextcloud. In 2020, French president
Emmanuel Macron stated "If we don't build our own champions in all areas — digital, artificial intelligence — our choices will be dictated by others." This transition is increasingly characterized as a "Third Gutenberg Moment," where the integration of AI and digital currencies is seen as a prerequisite for maintaining national sovereignty and economic relevance. In 2023, the EU passed the
Chips Act to encourage
semiconductor production, followed in 2024 by the
Artificial Intelligence Act regulating AI technology. In 2024, a coalition of academics and policy-makers called for limiting EU's dependence on foreign technology by investing in European cloud digital infrastructure, under an initiative labelled
EuroStack. The trend of digital sovereignty in Europe was sparked by Microsoft when the company disabled the Outlook email account of the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), a court based in The Hague, Netherlands, in 2025. == Limitations ==