Evolution of Cloud Systems in the Middle East

Data gotten and examined by "Arabi Post" on the map of cloud service centers and regions (information centers) in the Middle East and North Africa revealed that the region's countries rely heavily on American business for cloud services. The data reveals the existence of around 31 American centers, the majority of them in Gulf nations, while the number of centers owned by Chinese companies reached about 7.

In the Gulf countries, more than 53% of the cloud infrastructure tracked there is American. Source: "Arabi Post" database of cloud service centers in the Middle East and North Africa (89 centers).

Within a couple of years, cloud service centers have moved from a "technical option" for reducing server expenses into important infrastructure for the state and the economy: e-government websites, payment and banking systems, health and education platforms, and the operation of huge information, expert system, and more. The recent Iran war (2026) exposed a brand-new measurement: the cloud itself can be directly and physically targeted, as occurred when Iranian drone strikes damaged Amazon AWS cloud service data centers in the UAE and Bahrain, causing disturbances and service failures.

Advancing Digital Innovation in Middle East Hubs

But the significance of American and foreign companies does not stop at technical competition or service quality; it extends to digital sovereignty and questions of control over data for these countries and their different sensitive sectors. American companies go through U.S. laws managing legal access to data, such as the CLOUD Act, raising concerns about the limits of judicial ask for data even when it is kept outside the United States.

"CLOUD Act" (March 2018): Section 2713 explicitly compels communications and computing service companies to maintain and divulge customer information within their "ownership, custody, or control, regardless of whether it is located within or outside the United States" confirming the point above., as presented by U.S

At the exact same time, specialists gotten in touch with by "Arabi Post" warn of the risks of focusing contracts with American cloud service companies, and of the impact of "foreign jurisdiction" on privacy and security.

ANSR July GCC PRs 50DR+

Leading Digital Innovation Strategies for GCC

residents or locals who connect with people or companies in those countries where information centers operated by American companies keep the information of those countries and their people. To comprehend the scope of this risk, it is needed to first analyze U.S. federal laws such as FISA Section 702 and the CLOUD Act, which governs U.S.

Although the CLOUD Act grants Washington broad authority to gain access to information kept in data centersthe large-scale infrastructure used by business to shop and process informationin some cases, under the Act, U.S. authorities may be required to alert the government of the nation concerned that there is a legal basis compelling access to that information.

The U.S. government might also penalize or target any U.S. citizen who takes part in financial transactions with that country or sends cash transfers to individuals there. Abu Al-Saad likewise says that if a dispute were to occur between that country and Washington, the United States could suspend its information storage services for that nation and validate doing so.

ANSR July GCC PRs 50DR+

This would impact all sectors, including financial and banking services. In the context of the security threats linked to nations' reliance on American data centers, another point also emergesone that Ibtihal Abu Al-Saad thinks about the most important and most hazardous: the U.S. legal and intelligence tool understood as "National Security Letters" (NSLs).

Future of Cloud Systems in the Middle East

federal intelligence and security companies. Under these letters, U.S. authorities have the capability to force major technology business to hand over delicate data connected to citizens or nations. Washington could, for example, force Amazon to open data records coming from users in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, or somewhere else, while "imposing a strict nondisclosure order that avoids the technology business from alerting the Bahraini federal government or the targeted people that this access has taken place.