Thread

1. rishikeshs · 1789595308 · focus · HN ↗

   I think this is due to the data residency requirements in UAE. I'm working with a client in the health space and the government requirements requires me to store data only in UAE! Tried with AWS but they were not allowing any new instances and I had to go with Azure.

   1. dannyobrien · 1789599969 · focus · HN ↗

      Hi, I'm from the past. When countries in the 2010s -- especially Western countries -- started seeing data residency requirements as an acceptable aspect of national policies, as opposed to a weird authoritarian thing that only China and Russia imposed on their citizens, we[1] spent a bunch of time explaining to their lawmakers that having geographical redundancy was a good thing, actually, and that you should stop insisting on where the data resided for jurisdictional purposes and start talking about where administrative access and encryption keys lived.

      [1] OK, "we" here is probably just me -- it was one of those things where the chances of successfully convincing anyone was so small, and the commercial advantages of just nodding along, and then changing your product offering was so great, that really very few people raised it or had reason to. But somebody had to!

      1. mitxela · 1789601851 · focus · HN ↗

         Is there not more than one data center in your country? Is the power feed at your office too small to put a computer there?

         1. [deleted] · 1789602613 · focus · HN ↗

            [deleted]

         2. dannyobrien · 1789602630 · focus · HN ↗

            I think both of these things are (very) often true, but it is also true that if I'm going to have backups, it is (all other things being equal) better to minimize correlated risk. The assumption in a lot of these conversations is that having the data "in one place" (ie inside a country) was "safer" than having it in "somewhere else". The tougher counterintuitive argument was that it can be safer to have data stored in multiple places, for some risk assessments -- and that for others, having data close by was less important, in the case of seizure or surveillance or illegal use, than who had legal or effective access to that data.

            1. mitxela · 1789625770 · focus · HN ↗

               > I think both of these things are (very) often true,

               You think most countries have one data center or less, and most offices have less than two hundred watts of electricity supply?

               1. dannyobrien · 1789982321 · focus · HN ↗

                  No, I was agreeing with you.

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