It is a decision that marks a turning point in French digital policy: the government has announced the transfer of the national health data platform — the Health Data Hub — from Microsoft Azure servers to those of Scaleway, a subsidiary of the Iliad group (Free). A long-awaited change, but one that raises as many questions as it resolves.

Why is France leaving Microsoft for its health data?

Since 2019, the Health Data Hub has centralized the medical data of tens of millions of French citizens. This platform aggregates information from hospitals, general practitioners, laboratories, and mutual insurance companies to allow researchers to analyze epidemiological trends on a large scale.

The problem: Microsoft is an American company. As such, it is subject to the CLOUD Act (Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data Act), a US law passed in 2018 that allows American authorities to access data hosted by US providers, even when stored on European servers.

"The health data of French citizens cannot be subject to the jurisdiction of a third country. This is a matter of national sovereignty."

The CNIL — France's data protection authority — had already refused to definitively validate hosting with Microsoft, precisely because of these risks related to the extraterritoriality of American law. This refusal, combined with growing awareness of digital sovereignty, ultimately led to the migration decision.

Scaleway: the French cloud chosen to replace Azure

Scaleway, the cloud operator of the Iliad group founded by Xavier Niel, was selected to host this sensitive data. Based in France and subject to European law, Scaleway offers legal guarantees that an American host cannot provide.

The migration will not happen overnight. According to available information, the platform is expected to be fully operational between late 2026 and early 2027. Until then, transitional measures will ensure service continuity for the researchers and healthcare professionals who use the platform daily.

What is the Health Data Hub?

The Health Data Hub is much more than a simple storage space. It is an infrastructure that enables:

• Centralizing medical data from multiple sources (hospitals, SNDS, laboratories, doctors)
• Facilitating research on chronic diseases, epidemiological trends, or treatment effectiveness
• Providing researchers (public and private) with anonymized datasets for artificial intelligence in healthcare
• Strengthening the French healthcare system through better knowledge of the population's needs

It becomes clearer why the question of hosting is so strategic. A leak or unauthorized access to this data could have considerable consequences for millions of people.

A landmark decision for digital sovereignty

This transfer to Scaleway is part of a broader trend in Europe: the repatriation of sensitive data to national or European infrastructures. The European Data Act, progressively coming into effect, and the AI Act now impose enhanced requirements on data localization and governance.

France is not alone in taking this turn. Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden have also undertaken similar steps to reduce their dependence on major American cloud players — the so-called Big Tech composed of Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud.

The paradox of the initial choice

Ironically, Microsoft was selected in 2019 without a public tender. A decision made in haste — amid the surge in demand for large-scale health data processing — but one that attracted criticism from the outset. Digital rights associations, researchers, and elected officials had warned about the risks from the announcement.

Five years later, the choice is finally being corrected. But this story perfectly illustrates the challenges that digital transition poses for states: speed of deployment vs long-term control of data.

What this concretely changes for citizens

For the vast majority of French citizens, this change will be completely invisible in their daily lives. No one will notice a difference between a doctor's visit before or after the migration. What changes is the legal guarantee behind the scenes.

In practice, here is what this migration ensures:

• Your medical data can no longer be transmitted to American authorities under the CLOUD Act
• The host is subject exclusively to French and European law
• In case of dispute, remedies are more accessible and transparent for European citizens
• The data processing chain remains under the control of GDPR-compliant structures without risk of conflict with foreign legislation

A strong signal for the European cloud industry

This contract is a windfall for Scaleway and the sovereign European cloud ecosystem. It demonstrates that it is possible to replace American giants for national-scale projects, and that European players now have the technical maturity to take on this responsibility.

Similar projects are beginning to emerge in other sectors: justice, defense, national education. The question is no longer whether Europe will repatriate its data, but at what speed this movement accelerates.

In this context, the French initiative on health data could well serve as a model — or at least as a full-scale experiment whose lessons will be invaluable in the years ahead.