DigitalOcean and Brexit FAQ

Overview

The UK left the EU (“Brexit”) on January 31, 2020. The UK is in a transition period until the end of December 2020. We don’t expect Brexit to have any impact on our customers’ use of DigitalOcean services or cause any interruption to our supply of services. During and after the transition period, customers will be able to transfer data into and out of our Datacenter Regions throughout the European Economic Area (“EEA”) and the UK, just as they did before Brexit.

Transfers between the EEA and the UK during the transition period.

During the transition period, EU laws will continue to apply (including the GDPR). Transfers of personal data between the EEA and the UK during the transition period will not be considered to be transfers to a third country under the GDPR and will not require any additional safeguards.

Transfers from the EEA to the UK after the transition period.

If no special arrangements for transfer are agreed between the UK and the EU, then DigitalOcean customers wishing to transfer personal data from the EEA to the UK can rely on the Standard Contractual Clauses (“SCCs”) for the transfer. The SCCs are contained within DigitalOcean’s Data Processing Agreement.

You can read the European Data Protection Board’s note regarding the use of SCCs in connection with Brexit here.

Transfers from the UK to the EEA (and other countries) after the transition period.

The UK government intends to grant “adequacy” to all EEA countries for the purposes of personal data flows so that additional safeguards will not be necessary. This would be relevant to customers wishing to transfer personal data from the UK to the EEA. The UK government also intends to recognize existing EU adequacy decisions and the European Commission-approved SCCs (which are the same as those in our DPA) as a basis for international data transfers after the transition period.

Additional Resources

If you would like to understand how to migrate droplets using DigitalOcean Snapshots, please take a look at our guide for further information here

If you have further questions please do not hesitate to contact us at privacy@digitalocean.com.