Earlier this year, the European Union and Brazil inaugurated a new fibre-optic cable to carry terabytes of data faster and more securely between our two continents. This helps scientists in Europe and Latin America to work together on issues from climate modelling to disaster mitigation.

The cable starts in the EU, where its General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) became the gold standard of data protection, and ends in Brazil, which recently introduced a similar law. The cable links two continents together, building a data economy that respects the privacy of its citizens' data. This is how Europe approaches connectivity - bringing partners together without creating unwanted dependencies.