EU Data Act
In shortSince September 2025 no cloud provider may charge you for leaving.
The Data Act is the most practically effective sovereignty rule currently in force — and the least known. It has applied since 12 September 2025.
What Chapter VI covers
The part that matters most to companies concerns switching between data processing services, meaning cloud and edge.
Switching charges are gone. From January 2027 providers may charge nothing at all for a switch; during the transition before that, only costs actually incurred. The exit fees that used to make data exports unaffordable are finished.
Deadlines are mandated. A notice period of at most two months, a transition period of 30 days, extendable where the switch genuinely needs longer.
Functional equivalence. For infrastructure services the provider must ensure the service works substantially the same at the new provider. For higher-level services the duty is lighter — there it is about open interfaces and documentation.
Protection against third-country access. Article 32 obliges providers to take all reasonable technical, legal and organisational measures to prevent the transfer of data held in the EU to third-country authorities where no international agreement supports it.
What it does not cover
It compels nobody to switch, and it changes nothing about process knowledge, grown automations and retraining effort. See Vendor lock-in.
The practical lever
If your provider tells you an export is "not supported" or costs extra, that has not been a negotiating position since September 2025. It is a legal question. Use it — ideally before you need it. See Exit strategy.