Re: [Firebase] Data Privacy fo EU customers / Safe Harbor

[James Tamplin]

Hi JBR -

We've only had one other request for Safe Harbor, so we've prioritized other features ahead of it. 

Is this a requirement before you use Firebase? We do intend to be Safe Harbor compliant in the future.

James

On Sun, Apr 28, 2013 at 3:41 AM, jbr <ma...@jubari.com> wrote:

Hello everyone,

I'm currently in the process of evaluating Firebase for use in a project

and the question of "Safe Harbor" for european customers came up.

Would love to know what the status is...

Is it EU Data Protection Directive compliant?

Cheers

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[James Tamplin]

Understood, thanks for this.

I'll have a chat with our lawyers and will get back to you on an update of how we'll handle this. (It might be the week after next since we're a little busy at the moment)

Thanks!

James

On Sun, Apr 28, 2013 at 12:10 PM, jbr <ma...@jubari.com> wrote:

Hey James,

thanks for replying and this great service.

This is a little bit of a generalization,

but a lot of companies in the EU handle Safe Harbor rather "loosely".

I may have done so myself with a project or two *cough heroku cough*

The problem is that we officially are not allowed to use firebase,

unless it's Safe Harbor compliant (which is a total pain in the neck,

but so is getting dragged into a lawsuit over it)

So Firebase becoming compliant would be a big +1 for us.

I appreciate it being on the roadmap,

but for the time being it seems to be a bad idea to use firebase in the EU.

If anyone else has more experience in this topic or a different opinion,

I'm all ears.

[Austin Birch]

Hello,

I think the one other request for Safe Harbor may have been me.

Is there any update on this? I know you all must be really busy, it’s just such a great service that I would love to be able to use it.

Thanks,

Austin

[Andrew Lee]

Hi Austin -

No update at this time unfortunately.

-Andrew

Andrew Lee

Founder, Firebase

http://twitter.com/startupandrew

[Austin Birch]

Hi Andrew,

Thanks for the reply, I'll keep an eye out for any updates.

Thanks again,
Austin

[Jonas Weber]

Hi Andrew,

any updates on this? Safe Harbor is really important for us Europeans...

Thanks in advance,
Jonas

[Mark Marijnissen]

Hi,

I have a potential client who wants this. Is there any update on this?

Thanks

Mark

[Patrick Sears]

I'm going to throw in here as well. We'd like to use this as our service platform rather than having to host and manage our own server backend, but as we're also European based, Safe Harbour is a requirement.

You guys are going to be deeply limited competitively if you can't support this.

That said it does *appear* to be compliant out of the box, but a legal review is certainly required.

Patrick

[James Tamplin]

Hi All -

Thanks for making your voices heard here. This is clearly important for many of you and we'll bump the priority on getting this done.

Apologies for leaving some of you waiting, we've been a little busy.

Thanks again for using Firebase, we're grateful to have you using the product.

James

--

[Fabrice Marchal]

Hi

Has there be any progress in this direction? Is there  a solution with EU-based servers or Safe Harbor?

Fabrice

[Michael Wulf]

Hello Fabrice,

James's last message is still the authoritative answer: We don't support safe harbor at present, but it's on the road map and is a priority for us.

I'll be moderating all future me too and +1 discussions to this thread. Please watch the mailing list and the blog for news.

Cheers,

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[Clement Mellinas]

Hello, 

I need it too.

Unfortunately for Europe there are no lot of solutions for Firebase Users storing "personal data" : 

- Firebase Safe Harbor 
- Signing standard European clauses 

- Storing data in Europe for Firebase (European Cloud and allowing customers to choose where they want to store data)

So +1 for me 

Cheers,

[Tobias Braner]

Hi there,

while Firebase is getting more and more popular also in Europe there is still the Safe Harbor and European Cloud Issue. My team loves Firebase, nevertheless we cannot take a App that builds on Firebase to production. Here in Germany privacy and data protection is a big thing. Is there any update on this issue?

Thanks, BR, Tobias

[Bhuvan Khanna]

+1

Evaluating Firebase for a customer, and would love to use it, but this is a deal breaker :(

Hope to hear back soon.

Thanks
Bhuvan

[James Tamplin]

Hi Bhuvan & Tobias - 

Thanks for asking about Safe Harbor. Now that we've joined Google, we're actively working on making Firebase safe harbor compliant. 

I don't have a specific date for you unfortunately.

James

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[Laurence Bargery]

Hi James,

Thanks for the information. I'm part of a small company in the UK looking to develop apps too and at the moment we've been using Firebase for our backend requirements. However, we're also blocked by the safe harbour issue unfortunately and are now having to look for alternative solutions. Is there any sense of a timescale before Firebase supports this?

Thanks,

Laurence

[Jacob Wenger]

Hey Laurence,

As James mentioned last week, we do not have a date for this since we have no idea how long it will take. I would not expect to hear any news on this for many months. It is on our long-term roadmap though and we get lots of requests for it. There are many things that go into it and a lot of things we need to do before it is even an option.

Jacob

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[James Tamplin]

Hi Laurence -

It's your lucky day.

Firebase is now officially Safe Harbor compliant!

We fall under Google's broader Safe Harbor certification (which you can view here).

We'll be moving over to displaying Google Cloud's ToS and Privacy docs on the Firebase site in the coming months.

Happy coding!

James

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[Laurence Bargery]

Hi James,

Thanks very much for the response and the good news!

Laurence

[Sebastian Ezequiel Ovide]

Hi James

Does it mean that we can choose where the servers are located ? perhaps from the dashboard ?

if yes, I think I'm going to cry. unbelievable !

I was having nightmares thinking on what alternative I should be using for being in Europe !

[Clement Mellinas]

Great news,

I have always believed in your product and such news relieve me ! :)

Thanks

[James Tamplin]

Hi Sebastian,

You can't choose where servers are located unfortunately. We are now compliant with EU privacy regulations, so you should feel comfortable using us from Europe even if the data isn't stored there.

Best,

James

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[Tobias Braner]

Hi James,

usually we offer apps and services that operate on critical business data. So the issue is not only the EU privacy regulation, but the trust that EU customers don't have in US hosting. The first thing the customers ask is "where is the data stored". If the answer is Europe they probably can live with this answer. If the answer is Germany it would be perfect. Other answers won't be accepted. :(

BR,

Tobias

[James Tamplin]

Hi Tobias -

I understand that it's not palatable for some customers to have their data stored outside Europe. As we continue to integrate more with Google's infrastructure the location of your data may be an option we can offer. I'll update this thread if we make headway on that.

Cheers,

James

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[Tobias Braner]

Hi James,

hope you are fine. Any progress on this?

Thanks, BR Tobias

[Jacob Wenger]

No updates since the last post. As James mentioned, we will surely update this thread when we have something to add.

Cheers,

Jacob

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[Istvan Orban]

Hi James,

I am wondering if there is any progress on this one?

We are just abuot to start a project for which I need to define how we will approach the backend. Firebase would be an ideal candidate although we need to store data in the EU.

Looking forward to your respose.

Kind Regards,

Istvan

[Mike Mcdonald]

Hi Istvan (and others),

As Firebase is part of Google, we are included in their certification (linked here).

That said, not all Firebase features offer regional data centers (Database, Storage, and Hosting are currently US only). Most of the other features (Analytics, Config, etc.) make no promises about where data is stored or processed, but are Privacy Shield compliant.

Thanks,

--Mike