Data localization, a term invented less than a handful of years ago, is getting a lot of attention—both for good and bad. The draft of the Democratic party platform includes a commitment to oppose data localization across the world, so that’s good. The fact that the party has to do so is distressing, indicating that data localization has become increasingly popular in some parts of the world. Opposing data localization should be a bipartisan endeavor, and Republicans this week should speak out against it because data localization harms freedom of speech, economic growth, and a free and open internet. Data localization is a government requirement that data should physically stay within a particular jurisdiction’s boundaries, perhaps subject to limited and onerous exceptions. For example, Russia passed a data localization law in 2014, requiring that data about Russians be held on a server within that country (though copies of the data can be moved abroad). While the Russian government justified it as necessary to mitigate U.S. spying and defend the country’s “digital sovereignty”, the law seems designed to help Russia’s own intelligence services by keeping information about Russians within their easy reach. Data localization not only helps local spies, but can be a good way to impede competition from abroad. Foreign companies face three unattractive options: (1) bear the costs of either building out new server facilities or renting space on local servers in each of the countries requiring data localization; (2) quit those markets; or (3) ignore the obligation and hope to escape scrutiny. [...] <http://blogs.cfr.org/cyber/2016/07/20/why-democrats-and-republicans-should-o...>