The French government has decided to reduce its dependence on US technology companies in light of the growing divide between the US and the EU.
The Direction interministérielle du numérique (DINUM), an agency responsible for digitalization issues, has announced that it will soon replace Windows with a Linux-based operating system. Previously, the French government had chosen to replace Zoom and Microsoft Teams videoconferencing apps with Visio, an open-source communication tool.
This appears to be just the beginning of a more far-reaching process to strengthen the EU’s independence from the US, TechCrunch reports.
“DINUM will coordinate a cross-ministerial plan to reduce dependence on suppliers outside Europe,” the agency said in a statement. “Each ministry will be required to develop its own plan by this fall, covering the following areas: workstations, collaboration tools, antivirus software, artificial intelligence, databases, virtualization, and network equipment.”