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Cisco Webex to deliver sovereign controls for European customers, together with Deutsche Telekom and Eviden, an Atos business.
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With these controls, encryption keys for Webex Meetings, Messaging and Calling User-Generated Information are hosted and effectively controlled by trusted European partners. Key management controls will be operated within the EU, separate from Cisco’s infrastructure.
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The new Sovereign Controls feature will be available to EU customers in Spring 2024.
Cisco announces new Webex by Cisco (Webex) collaborations with Deutsche Telekom and Eviden to provide sovereign controls for European customers, from small to large businesses, education, banking, healthcare organizations, municipalities and public administration. With this setup, encryption keys for Webex Meetings, Messaging and Calling User-Generated Information will be managed and hosted either by Deutsche Telekom or Eviden, on European soil. The keys will be held and managed by the two trusted partners and remain separate from Cisco’s infrastructure.
With the new Sovereign Controls feature, Cisco builds upon its existing EU data residency program with additional control European customers can exercise over their data. Trusted European partners manage and store encryption keys in local data centers. By isolating the encryption key management in the EU, customers have greater control over the security of their User-Generated Information, including meeting recordings and transcripts, messages, shared files, and voicemails. This adds an enhanced layer of protection to Webex’s built-in privacy and security features and the EU data residency program, enabling customers to meet their needs through trusted EU partners.
“This new feature demonstrates Webex’s commitment to deliver cloud solutions that meet evolving European privacy and security requirements”, said Javed Khan, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco Collaboration. “It paves the way for future sovereignty solutions for Government, highly-regulated industries, and the upcoming EUCS certification scheme.”
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Leading the Way in Innovation and Data Encryption
This solution will offer organizations a way to leverage the latest cloud and collaboration innovations while keeping their content encrypted within the EU, with sovereign management over data encryption. Customers will be able to choose a European cloud provider that they know and trust, without the complexity or cost of hosting their own encryption keys, while maintaining control of their data. Customers will have the option to purchase technical support where service requests are managed by EU nationals located in the EU.
“We are proud to enable Webex customers to raise the level of control on their sensitive data by using our Encryption Services powered by Eviden’s in-house Trustway Proteccio™ hardware security module (HSM), the only HSM granted the Reinforced Qualification by the French National Cybersecurity Agency (ANSSI), in addition to Common Criteria EAL4+ certification and EU Restricted agreement,” says Zeina Zakhour, vice president CTO Digital Security at Eviden. “Developed, manufactured, and operated in Europe, our HSM is securely hosted in a data center outside the cloud.”
Webex has been leading in end-to-end encryption (E2EE) for years, delivering Zero-Trust End-to-End Encryption for meetings as an option, as well as E2EE for user-generated content. This extra layer of state-of-the-art security will safeguard data from interception. Data is encrypted in transit and at rest so that customers are the only ones who have access to their meeting content throughout its lifecycle.
Building upon strong privacy and security features
Webex already offers EU data residency, enabling customers to comply with data regionalization needs and requirements. In addition, Webex is the first and currently only collaboration and conferencing solution to achieve the highest level of adherence with the EU Cloud Code of Conduct (EU Cloud CoC), a transnational framework for cloud service providers to demonstrate compliance with the EU GDPR.
Further, the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) has confirmed that the use of Webex by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), meets the rigorous rules for the processing of personal data by the EU’s institutions and bodies. Webex is the first and currently the only videoconferencing platform to have attained such approval.
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