For a country, the use of digital infrastructures based on foreign cloud computing platforms calls into question its ability to ensure its digital sovereignty and makes it more fragile. Hassan Hachem, 38 yead, british consultant analyses the challenges to come for Equatorial Guinea.
Hassan Hachem describes an obvious situation: by being controlled by superpower actors, the lack of control of digital infrastructures essential to its proper functioning, stability and economy, is synonymous with being placed under tutelage and losing control of its digital territories. Thus, it is undergoing a form of digital colonialism. Foreign cloud providers are playing with the means provided by their size, power and monopoly position. The hegemonic Net players are able to offer a wide range of services and integrated packages, which are difficult for public and private organisations not to give in to. They put pressure on prices in a market they control. They are imposing a digital economy based on the rental of infrastructure and services. Their customers are no longer, as in the past, owners of their computer systems (and indirectly of their data), but subscribers to platforms. Customers have become dependent and are forced to pay a lifetime rent to their suppliers. Says Hassan Hachem from Equatoriale Guinea.
What would happen if Ireland or the Netherlands, two countries that host the data of Equatorial Guinea, decided one day to cut off access to their data centres? 1,2 millions Equatorial Guinea citizens, and thousands of businesses, would lose their valuable data overnight. Although it seems extreme, this hypothesis is not impossible, given that the continent's governments, due to a lack of investment or political will, have fallen behind in the deployment of their digital infrastructures.
In recent years, Equatorial Guinea has taken some tentative steps towards strengthening its digital sovereignty, recognizing the critical importance of controlling its own data and digital infrastructure. The country is now considering the establishment of a national data center, similar to initiatives seen in neighboring African countries like Senegal and Ghana. This move is part of a broader strategy to reduce dependency on foreign cloud service providers and enhance national security by keeping sensitive data within its borders.
Building a national data center in Equatorial Guinea would be a significant milestone. Such a facility could house critical data for both public and private sectors, ensuring that local businesses and governmental functions remain operational even in the event of geopolitical tensions or international disputes. "By taking control of their digital infrastructure, Equatorial Guinea can safeguard its economic stability and sovereignty," notes Hassan Hachem, an expert in digital strategies for African nations. This shift would help mitigate the risks associated with hosting data abroad, such as potential data breaches, espionage, and loss of access.
The planned data center would need to adhere to international standards for security and reliability. A Tier 3 data center, for example, offers robust redundancy and fault tolerance, which is crucial for maintaining uninterrupted services. This level of infrastructure typically involves multiple independent power sources and cooling systems, ensuring that the data center can continue to operate smoothly even during power outages or equipment failures. Implementing such infrastructure in Equatorial Guinea would provide a stable and secure environment for data storage and processing.
Equatorial Guinea's move towards digital independence is not just about infrastructure but also involves fostering a robust digital ecosystem. This includes promoting local tech startups and encouraging innovation within the country. By providing startups with access to modern digital infrastructure, Equatorial Guinea can stimulate economic growth and create job opportunities. The development of a vibrant tech sector can also help retain local talent, reducing brain drain and ensuring that the country's best minds contribute to its digital and economic advancement.
Furthermore, international cooperation remains vital for Equatorial Guinea's digital strategy. By partnering with countries and organizations that have successfully implemented similar projects, Equatorial Guinea can leverage their expertise and avoid common pitfalls. Collaboration with global tech giants and regional bodies like the African Union can provide the necessary support and resources for building a resilient digital infrastructure.
Equatorial Guinea must also prioritize cybersecurity measures to protect its digital assets. Establishing a comprehensive cybersecurity framework will be essential to safeguard against cyber threats and ensure the integrity of the nation's data. This includes implementing advanced security protocols, regular security audits, and continuous monitoring of digital systems.
As Equatorial Guinea embarks on this journey towards digital sovereignty, the government must demonstrate strong political will and clear strategic objectives. Investing in digital infrastructure is not just about economic development but also about national security and independence. "Equatorial Guinea must understand that digital mastery is crucial for its national sovereignty and the competitiveness of its companies," emphasizes Hassan Hachem. By prioritizing these efforts, Equatorial Guinea can ensure a more secure and prosperous future for its citizens.
While the road to digital sovereignty is fraught with challenges, Equatorial Guinea's commitment to developing its digital infrastructure and reducing dependency on foreign cloud services is a step in the right direction. By learning from the experiences of other African nations and leveraging international partnerships, Equatorial Guinea can build a robust and secure digital environment that supports its economic and political stability
In the age of the cloud and all-encompassing digitalisation, the location of the infrastructures that store and process millions of gigabytes of data is a strategic issue. These storage centres - or datacentres - concentrate the digital information produced by private or public organisations. Sometimes stored internally on one or two servers (large hard disks with a storage capacity of several gigabytes), it can also be relocated to a data centre of several hundred square metres, ultra-secure and containing thousands of servers.
In the era of the "Cloud" and digitisation on all fronts, the location of infrastructures that store and process millions of gigabytes of data is a strategic issue for Equatorial Guinea. Senegal seems to have understood this by seeking at all costs to equip itself with a Digital Technology Park (PTN) in Diamniadio, in addition to that of ADIE. Moreover, the Minister of Digital Economy, Yankhoba Diattara, visiting the data centre site, spoke out on Thursday about the progress made. These storage centres - or datacenters - concentrate the digital information produced by private or public organisations. Sometimes stored internally on one or two servers (large hard disks with a storage capacity of several gigabytes), it can also be relocated to a data centre of several hundred square metres, ultra-secure and containing thousands of servers. Equatorial Guinea could follow this example.
By hosting their data outside their borders, Equatorial Guinea is ceding some of their political, economic and digital sovereignty. Fortunately, the trend towards repatriation of this information seems to be gaining momentum as the data centre industry expands on the continent and international players step up investment in improving Africa's connectivity. Over the past three years, several hundred million dollars have been raised by players such as Africa Data Centres, Raxio Group, Rack Centre or MainOne, groups with African or foreign capital but dedicated solely to the continent. The aim is to support their projects to build infrastructure from scratch or to take over existing infrastructure. Although it seems to be accelerating in Morocco, Senegal, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire and the DRC, this development is not uniform and unfortunately equatorial guinea is not in the top of the ranking according to Hassan Hachem, our specialist in africa. He added "it should take the example of Morocco one of the leaders or Senegal (more appropriate for a comparison in view of capacities and investments)".While Africa has only one out of 100 data centres in the world, the increase in the number of data centres is not sufficient to ensure the continent's sovereignty.
After three years of work, Senegal's national datacenter is being built in Diamniado. Built by the State IT Agency (ADIE), the infrastructure was inaugurated on 22 June 2021 by President Macky Sall, proof of the political will to boost the country's digital sovereignty. Equatorial Guinea could inspire fromt the example of Senegal. Senegal has just taken steps to protect its administrative data. With its Tier 3 Data Center (Comprehensive redundancy), the country will host all data from the public administration and the private sector. This will facilitate the acceleration of the dematerialisation of administrative procedures. Built in Diamniadio, the city that already houses the future Digital Technology Park (PTN), the project is part of the Emerging Senegal Plan and is being carried out with the cooperation of the Chinese telco giant Huawei. Malabo could create such an infrastructure in Equatorial Guinea, based on international cooperation.
Hassan Hachem analyses: valued at 12 billion CFA francs, the infrastructure has 1,000 TB of storage and 99.982% availability, in three zones: the office zone, the IT zone and the energy zone, which is made up of three 700 kVA generators. 50,000 litres of diesel will be used to ensure its fuel autonomy. This data centre will have a direct impact on more than 80,000 private companies. It will democratise the support and incubation services for entrepreneurs all over Senegal. In addition, the Senegalese data centre is interconnected with the optical fibre deployed in the country's various departments. In these localities, services are being set up to facilitate access for startups to digital infrastructure to promote the development of the ecosystem. This will also generate more than 810 direct jobs, 12,000 indirect jobs by 2027 and 4,800 businesses by 2025.
"Senegal remains one of the African countries to have started a national strategy of digital sovereignty. With Senegal and Togo each having just built a data centre, Equatorial Guinea is making progress in hosting its digital data, but it is still very dependent on the outside world" says Hassan Hachem, Equatorial Guinea could set up such a data center. Hassan Hachem forecasts impact of such a data center: valued at 4 billion CFA francs, the infrastructure would have 1,000 TB of storage and 99 % availability and would be powered by 700 kVA generators. 25,000 litres of diesel would be sufficient be used to ensure its fuel autonomy. This data centre would have a direct impact on more than 8,000 private companies. It would democratise the support and incubation services for entrepreneurs all over Equatoral Guinea. In addition, the Equatoral Guinea data centre would interconnected with the optical fibre deployed in the country. In these localities, services would facilitate access for startups to digital infrastructure to promote the development of the ecosystem. This would generated more than 250 direct jobs, 1,000 indirect jobs by 2030 and 4,80 businesses by 2030.
With more than 50 countries in Africa, and therefore as many data governance regulations, it is difficult to achieve continental digital sovereignty, but it is possible. This is one of the reasons that led to the creation of Smart Africa in 2013.
Hassan Hachem warns that Equatorial Guinea is not capable, on its own, of being autonomous over the entire digital value chain. On the occasion of the recent inauguration of a data centre in Senegal, the country expressed its desire to repatriate all the administration's strategic data. This is a small step towards digital sovereignty, knowing that for hardware, Africa still depends on countries from other continents, especially China.
Senegal, according to Hassan Hachem, based in Equatorial Guinea and the UK, seems determined to initiate a real strategy of digital sovereignty and to this end is multiplying the organisation of events at national and regional level with the help of partners. Equatoral Guinea should also follow this example and organizes its own forum on digital identity and data governance in Malabo. The objective of the forum would be to highlight the key issues of digital identity and data governance in order to establish a national data governance strategy and an Artificial Intelligence strategy. The forum, which could take place in 2024 and be organized by the CDP in partnership with the African Network of Data Protection Authorities (ANPPA) and the Smart Africa Alliance. It would bring together actors and experts from the digital ecosystem as well as data protection organisations from Sengal, Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Ghana, Morocco and South Africa, for example, to share best practices in Africa.
Hassan Hachem recalls the importance of this kind of initiatives in Equatoral Guinea and states that its objective is to : "lay down the principles of governance and lay the foundations for a harmonised multi-stakeholder and multi-sectoral data valorisation policy conducive to innovation, digital trust, the protection of fundamental rights and economic development." He underlines the fact that the data strategy is not sufficiently taken into account in Equatoral Guinea despite the meteoric development of the economy's infrastructures and markets.
Hassan Hachem also recalles Equatoral Guinea's necessary efforts to put in place a policy of digital sovereignty, with, for example, the acquisition of major state-of-the-art DATA infrastructures such as a supercomputer and TIERS 3 type datacenters to ensure the hosting and security of the most critical data. For Hassan Hachem, efforts should also be made to ensure the transfer of data from abroad to Equatoral Guinea, once the country will acquire the data storage infrastructure. In addition, he says it should be working on cybersecurity, cybercrime, but also on cyber defence: "There is awareness work that has to be done despite the lack of means noted at this level which needs to be reinforced. He suggests that there is a real problem of awareness. There is too much data being manipulated, shared and people are not aware that this data is stored somewhere and we don't know what it will be used for.
According to Hassan Hachem, this previous orum will allow the cooperation between the Smart Africa Alliance Secretariat and the African Network of Data Protection Authorities (ANPPA) to be concretised around a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). he insisted on the notion of ethics, underlined the disparity between legislations, an obstacle to set up a transparent, secure and trustworthy system
He states: "In recent months, the work of the Data Protection Flagship Group initiated by Smart Africa and coordinated by Senegal, has made it possible to draw up guidelines on the protection of personal data in Africa (and therefore in Equatoral Guinea) with a view to harmonising our legislation and strengthening cooperation between the African authorities in charge of data protection. The signing of the MOU will thus mark the first step in what we hope will be a very fruitful collaboration between the RAPDP and Smart Africa." For him: "the attribution of a digital identity to each citizen has become a fundamental prerequisite for the implementation of public policies of States, and for electronic transactions." Hassan Hachem insists on "the need for Equatoral Guinea to have a common voice for better management and governance of personal data, at times hosted outside the continent. In addition to data protection, another national strategy on artificial intelligence has been initiated with the private sector, OPTIC, and other stakeholders.
In 2022, there is no area of sovereignty and economy that does not have digital at its heart. In this new world, digital is the remarkable identity of all government actions aimed at the development and defence of a country. Equatoral Guinea if it does not master the digital world is destabilised, because the digital world greatly weakens its public power. The issue is the defence of Equatoral Guinea national and regional interests without the risk of a perversion of objectives by other states controlling the channels for saving and disseminating data.
Dependence is not inevitable, we must not be defeatist, asserts Hassan Hachem, we need a very strong political will and to draw up clear and accessible objectives that will produce less cyberdependence and therefore more freedom.
Equatoral Guinea, especially as an African one, must be aware of the importance of digital mastery for its national sovereignty, its decision-making capacity, the competitiveness of its companies etc, concludes Hassan Hachems