Question about data security/hosting

[Mat_Scalpello]

Hi,
New to Airtable, I work in Local Government in the UK and whilst I think the product would work well for some projects I need to understand where data is hosted.
Under our Government rules any data I store in the cloud has to be on UK based servers. Most cloud providers we work with offer some kind of location specific hosting of data. I cannot find any information about whether Airtable is able to offer this?
Thanks in advance

[Christian_Stang]

Sadly there is absolutly no wriggle rom at the moment and Airtable are not GDPR compliant anymore by definition.
Are there no way you could consider extending the service to Hosting in Europe?

[Martijn_Hoppenb]

Yes indeed, at this moment, any data transferred to or stored in the US, is by definition not GDPR compliant. As far as i know, what would be the ‘best’ solution is an both a watertight DPA and EU only hosted servers/data.

[Bill_French]

Martijn_Hoppenbrouwe:

any data transferred to or stored in the US, is by definition not GDPR compliant.

I don’t think it’s that simple. I believe at least two of my clients have achieved GDPR compliance in the UK with Airtable. Has your “definition” factored in all of the possible exceptions and processing policies offered under the GDPR?

[Clement_Cremon]

This is something that would be absolutely necessary to be able to use Airtable in big european companies. Please consider it seriously!

[Jon_Schaffer]

I agree with several people in the thread @Clement_Cremon, @Christian_Stange @Mat_Scalpello. In order to be GDPR compliant most (all) EU companies need sensitive data to be hosted within EU, so it would be great if you can host in e.g. Ireland. We had the same problem with another US software provider and they are now hosting in Ireland. Hope to hear back… what is the status re. hosting in EU?

[D_B]

I work for a government agency within a EU country and I would love to use airtable. However, I cannot if the servers are not located within the EU. This has been stated by our own lawyers (not Airtable specifically) in regards to other SaaS solutions with cloud storage. It is, simply put, easier for Airtable to put servers in the EU than it is to get government agencies to change their stance on the topic. Frankly, it is a don quijote mission. It really doesn’t matter if you are right. Beaurocracy has won in my case and they will not take time and sit down with airtable and discuss, they have a million other things to do.

It would be great if airtable can have hosting within the EU. Cheers

[JN_tp]

@Jon_Schaffer @D_B @Mat_Scalpello Did you guys find an alternative software comparable to Airtable with servers in the EU?

[D_B]

Beside excel, unfortunately not. :frowning:

[Jon_Schaffer]

Not exactly, but we had to switch to Monday.com to be compliant

[Petr_Bartos]

“Microsoft Lists” (part of Office365) might be alternative product and in Office365 admin there is a switch to choose “EU data residency”