Vietnam Launches Tough Cyber Law

You wouldn't normally associate the country of Vietnam as being tough on cybercrime and data privacy, but you may want to think again. According to a Reuters story, Vietnam is preparing to vigorously enforce a new cybersecurity law passed this year in June. The law requires global technology companies to set up local offices and store data locally, similar to GDPR in Europe (although GDPR does not go quite as far).

While Vietnam is a communist nation and this new cybersecurity law could be viewed by some as an attempt to limit free speech and political dissent within the country, the law does represent a global change in how countries view public cloud computing.

Years ago, MSPAlliance warned about MSPs being swept up in regulations as a result of public cloud failures. While no significant MSPs have operations within Vietnam, more countries are likely going to follow this example by directly regulating public cloud organizations, and indirectly, private cloud providers, including MSPs.

The Reuters article goes on to claim that a "number of other countries in Asia and elsewhere are also pursuing data localization laws as they seek greater control over the internet." MSPs need to be aware of these types of laws for any jurisdiction where they practice managed services.