Breaking Fragmentation: Advancing Secure Cross-Border Digital Interoperability in European Defence

Europe cannot build defence readiness on fragmented digital foundations.

Across multinational defence programmes, digital systems that are already accredited in one trusted environment can still face additional certification,
hosting or security validation in another. That duplication delays capability deployment, raises costs, fragments collaboration and weakens Europe’s ability to scale trusted digital and dual use technologies at speed. At a time when defence systems are becoming more software-defined, data-driven and dependent on secure cross border cooperation, this is no longer a technical inconvenience. It is a strategic constraint.

This DIGITALEUROPE study examines one of the clearest manifestations of that problem: the deployment of digital systems handling RESTRICTED-level sensitive information in multinational defence programmes. Within this
space, fragmentation is especially visible in cloud hosting, accreditation, encryption, facility and personnel clearances, system certification and
the exchange of engineering and operational data. The result is repeated compliance effort, avoidable delay and weaker interoperability across European defence cooperation.

DIGITALEUROPE identifies one immediate policy priority: Europe needs stronger mutual recognition of accredited systems, validated security controls and equivalent assurance mechanisms across trusted EU and NATO environments, where comparable levels of protection can be demonstrated, for multinational programmes handling RESTRICTED-level sensitive information.

That should be the immediate policy priority.

Europe does not need full harmonisation of national security systems. That is neither feasible nor necessary. What Europe needs is pragmatic regulatory convergence: practical steps that preserve national sovereignty while reducing duplication, improving predictability and enabling trusted systems to move across borders faster.
DIGITALEUROPE’s contribution is to bring the operational reality of industry into this debate. The study is grounded in the experience of companies
deploying digital and dual-use technologies across multinational defence programmes and translates that experience into realistic policy action.

Europe should now act on five priorities:

• Establish project-based mutual recognition of accredited systems: Participating Member States should be able, on a voluntary and project-based basis, to recognise security controls, certifications and accreditation outcomes already validated in another trusted EU or NATO environment. This is the fastest and most practical way to cut duplication, reduce repeated certification and accelerate deployment while keeping justified national safeguards in place.
• Build secure interoperability through federated and layered architectures: Europe should support federated and layered digital architectures that allow nations to retain authority over sensitive data and national security infrastructures while enabling secure cross-border exchange, shared services and modular collaboration. This is the structural answer to fragmentation. It improves interoperability without forcing a single centralised model and creates a realistic foundation for cloud, AI and software-defined defence capabilities.
• Introduce faster and more predictable accreditation pathways: Europe cannot ask industry to innovate at commercial speed and then wait through open-ended approval cycles. Where feasible and without prejudice to national security assessments, routine personnel and facility approvals should move towards more predictable timelines, for example, 60–90 days for routine cases; system accreditations, which can vary more significantly in complexity, should also benefit from clearer predictability, including indicative benchmarks where feasible and appropriate. For rapidly evolving digital and dual-use technologies, procurement and deployment timelines should aim to move closer to 4–6 months where appropriate. Without measurable improvements in speed and predictability, Europe will continue to lose time where time matters most.
• Strengthen coordinated testing and validation environments: Europe should support a limited number of trusted, high-capacity testing and validation environments where digital solutions can be assessed once and then scaled more easily across national contexts. This is essential to reduce repeat validation, build confidence between authorities and help mature technologies move from pilot to operational use.
• Reduce barriers for SMEs, start-ups and digital-first innovators: Regulatory fragmentation falls hardest on the companies Europe most needs to bring in. SMEs, start ups, scale-ups and academic actors often
  lead in AI, cyber, cloud and secure software, but they have far fewer resources to manage repeated certification, divergent hosting rules
  and overlapping compliance demands. A more predictable and interoperable framework would not only improve efficiency. It would broaden Europe’s innovation base and strengthen the resilience of Europe’s defence technological and industrial base. Delivering these priorities will also require clearer national guidance, more strategic use of European and international standards and stronger pathways from simplification to operational deployment. Together, these measures would reduce uncertainty, improve interoperability and help trusted digital and dual-use technologies move more quickly from development to use across multinational European defence
  programmes.

The message is simple: Europe does not have to choose between national sovereignty and digital interoperability. It needs practical mechanisms that allow trusted systems to move across borders with more speed, more confidence and less duplication. That is how Europe will strengthen defence readiness and scale digital and dual-use innovation across multinational programmes. DIGITALEUROPE is ready to help drive that agenda by bringing forward the operational experience of the companies building these technologies across Europe.