It’s a fact: data has been monopolised by a small group of companies based in the US and China. Their business models focus exclusively on returns. They analyse data and resell it for the purposes of ad targeting. Their economic power involves a thinly veiled link to the political sphere. In practice, while one scandal follows another in the news, it has become almost impossible to trust these operators to protect data privacy.
This raises numerous questions, including:
Is it possible to guarantee the sovereignty of a cloud service without controlling the data centers, machines and software used to process the data?
Who processes our data which is physically hosted in Europe, when thousands of people are working on a different continent to develop, correct and update the software used to process this data?
Must disclosing data in exchange for a free cloud service inevitably become the norm?
Must professionals sacrifice data privacy to improve their productivity with online tools?
A free, secure and privacy-friendly Internet should be available to all. That is why we are accelerating the development of our alternatives to GAFAM and BATX. Our digital sovereignty, the environment, our jobs and our freedom are at stake. By choosing Infomaniak rather than one of the tech giants, you become part of the solution. You foster the recruitment of local competences and the development of independent, ethical technologies. And that makes all the difference.
1 – An Internet that respects confidentiality and privacy
“Independence is the underlying guarantee on which Infomaniak builds. It is what allows us to make absolutely no concessions with regard to security, privacy and data confidentiality, among other things.” Boris Siegenthaler, Infomaniak’s Head of Strategy
Infomaniak is not listed on any stock exchange and belongs exclusively to its employees and founders. That means that no one defines our priorities for us. In financial terms as for the rest, we alone set our course in line with our values and our ecological commitments.
Our developers are experts from the world of open source in which we are deeply rooted. Thanks to these talented people, we create independent solutions without relying on proprietary code or external interests. This software independence is naturally one of the keys to data sovereignty, but it also enables us to respond quickly to your changing needs, which we monitor closely.
We are therefore actively recruiting in order to accelerate our developments, as data sovereignty necessarily means control over our software. To overcome the shortage of developers on the labour market, Infomaniak contributes to the creation of new educational paths in order to train the next generation. EPFL, CREA, réalise and École 42: we foster the acquisition of competences which are of immediate use to the industry.
2 – Create a secure and attractive sovereign cloud for the whole of Europe
While most cloud operators call on external service providers on several levels in order to provide solutions and maintain their infrastructure, we master all the professions linked to our activity in order to guarantee compliance with our commitments. Data centers, software, jurisdiction: it is impossible to guarantee genuine data sovereignty without these three pillars.
Maintaining control of this data processing chain also involves our virtualisation technologies, based on OpenStack and developed by the Infomaniak engineers. In addition to developing the majority of our services within Switzerland, we also maintain control over the software layer that manages our cloud infrastructures. It is not by chance that 70% of our staff are engineers and developers.
Based in Switzerland, we benefit from a strict and extremely stable legal framework with one of the most stringent legislations in terms of data privacy and protection. We are not subject to the will of other countries and do not suffer the indiscretions or direct interference of governments. This is additional proof of control and sovereignty for our users.
3 – An uncompromising approach to ecology
Ecology and the climate are key issues of our time. In this respect, Infomaniak’s commitment and ambition far exceeds the usual standards, to such an extent that we offset all our CO2 emissions and have applied our own ethics and environmental charter since 2007. This calls on us to reduce our impact as far as possible.
To construct efficient data centers and recycle the heat generated by our servers
In the virtual world, a data center produces computing. In the real world, a data center produces heat. Boris Siegenthaler
While other operators build data centers which warm the oceans or installations covering 53 hectares, our data centers are cooled using filtered external air only, with no air-conditioning. From 2022, we will install solar panels on our data centers and at the end of 2023, we will begin work on a data center which will recycle all the heat generated by the servers to heat houses during the winter and produce hot water in the summer. It’s part of our vision for a fleet of smaller data centers that are integrated into eco-districts.
A 360° approach that leaves nothing to chance
By definition, technical measures cannot solve everything:
Since 2007, we have offset our CO2 emissions 100% and this figure has increased to 200% since 2017.
We extend the service life of our servers up to 15 years (1 server = 1.7 tonnes of CO2)
All our activities are powered exclusively by renewable energies.
We have chosen an ethical pension fund which does not invest in the sale of weapons or in authoritarian regimes, for example.
We promote soft mobility among our employees, with up to CHF 1,500 per year/employee.
We constantly measure the impact of our actions in line with the ISO 14001 and ISO 50001 standards.
4 – Innovation in favour of responsible, ethical and sustainable digital technology
Success does not come without responsibilities. Criticism is often levelled at companies that transfer their benefits to structures designed to reduce the tax they pay. We will never do this. Boris Siegenthaler
This is a crucial period in our history during which companies are quickly digitising their activities (Covid). It is therefore important to make the right choices as the cloud becomes more generalised. For users, this means entrusting their data to a company that shares their interests and values.
By choosing Infomaniak, you can count on support operatives based in Geneva and Winterthur to make your life easier, 7 days a week and in 5 languages. You can therefore always contact someone who understands what you are experiencing and who is capable of handing on your feedback directly to the teams of developers located in Switzerland, perhaps only a few metres or kilometres from where you are. We are accustomed to receiving special requests – part of our work involves handling tailor-made solutions for our customers.
For us, storing your data in Switzerland is about more than enhanced security and confidentiality. It’s about choosing a dependable and accessible partner that makes an enduring contribution to the regional economy. Marc Oehler, CEO of Infomaniak
We defend our ethical values to the very end by rejecting commercial practices such as Black Friday, which are contrary to the fundamental principles of a sustainable economy. The free products we offer are precisely that: free (SwissTransfer, kMeet, free email address, free kDrive, etc.). They are funded solely by the sale of our fee-paying services.
To establish these principles over time, we have become a member of Après-Ge, the social and solidarity-based economy network. This has enabled us to consolidate our principles while driving us to take them even further in the future. For example, we have undertaken to maintain a high level of transparency with regard to our financial information and to implement a balanced wage policy while developing a fulfilling and egalitarian work environment. Together, these commitments are yet another key to ensuring Infomaniak’s durability.
We will remain faithful to our principles
It is clear that our commitments focus on the long term. We will not abandon them and will not become an operator that jealously hoards the data of billions of users. We will continue to develop services independently to ensure the security and durability of your online activities.
Thank you for your feedback, for upholding our values and our commitments and, above all, for your trust and loyalty if you are already one of our customers. You can rely on us to defend our values and remain true to ourselves.
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