Exploring the new AWS European Sovereign Cloud: Sovereign Reference Framework

AWS introduces the European Sovereign Cloud’s Sovereign Reference Framework (ESC-SRF), a set of governance, operational, data residency, and technical isolation controls designed to meet EU sovereignty expectations, backed by independent third-party validation (SOC 2) and detailed documentation available via AWS Artifact. The framework emphasizes EU-only operations, strict customer data and metadata residency, separation from other AWS Regions, and incident response within the EU, providing customers with a transparent, validated foundation to design and evidence sovereign architectures.