At the French Senate, Microsoft France cannot guarantee data will not go to the US

2025-06-10 · Publisher : Sénat (Microsoft France) · Domain : Cloud & DevOps

Questioned under oath by the Senate inquiry on public procurement, Microsoft France's head of public affairs answers "no" when asked to guarantee that no data will be passed to US authorities without French agreement.

### Background On 10 June 2025, Anton Carniaux, Microsoft France's director of public and legal affairs, and Pierre Lagarde, technical director for the public sector, are heard by the **Senate inquiry committee on public procurement**. The rapporteur, Dany Wattebled, asks whether they can guarantee, under oath, that French citizens' data entrusted to Microsoft through Ugap will never be passed on, following a US government order, without the explicit agreement of the French authorities. ### Key facts - Anton Carniaux's answer: "No, I cannot guarantee it, but, once again, it has never happened." (translation of the French original) - He admits that, faced with a legitimate US court order, Microsoft is legally required to supply the requested data. - Microsoft highlights 2,200 employees in France, 10,500 partners and 80,000 jobs in its French ecosystem. - It recalls a 4-billion-euro investment announced in May 2024 and a goal of training 1 million French people in AI by 2027. - The transcript is public; the exchange was widely relayed in July 2025 by the international trade press. ### Why it matters The exchange makes explicit, through an executive under oath, the limit that public buyers suspected: hosting in France does not protect against an order based on the Cloud Act. It directly feeds the arguments for SecNumCloud and for immunity-from-extraterritorial-law clauses in public contracts. ### Takeaway A statement under oath that became a reference point in French debates on sovereign cloud.

Tags : Souveraineté, États-Unis, Azure, Réglementation, Données