At the mercy of Silicon Valley? Europe exposed by Trump AI export ban

At the mercy of Silicon Valley? Europe exposed by Trump AI export ban Issued on: Modified: Is it better to persuade or to confront? French leader Emmanuel Macron is opting for the royal treatment with Donald Trump at Versailles, what with a dinner to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the King of France's support for the birth of a new nation. It's all about keeping the US president on board: on Ukraine, reopening the Strait of Hormuz and more. But will flattery work when it comes to the AI revolution? Lunch preceded dinner with tech titans the guests of honour on the closing day of the G7 summit in the French Alps. There, the elephant in the room was Trump's sudden decision last Friday to give Anthropic 90 minutes to shut down foreign access to its latest artificial intelligence models. The reason cited: national security. How exposed are both governments and major corporations like French banking giant BNP Paribas, which recently announced it was partnering with Anthropic for its security needs? Can a stroke of the pen from the Oval Office suddenly expose the rest of the world to hackers? Read moreAnthropic disables access to top-tier AI models after US ban on foreign use For years, the same Europeans who counted on the US defence shield to protect them also banked on its big tech: everything from Visa credit cards and Google searches to Amazon deliveries and cloud storage. Amazon boss Jeff Bezos is the star attraction at this week's VivaTech trade fair in Paris. Silicon Valley's dominance has grown to the point where it draws the planet's money and data. Its billionaire bosses dictate their terms and oligarchs like Elon Musk peddle pro-Kremlin, far-right messaging on their platforms. So how does the rest of the world defend its own national security and sovereignty? Produced by François Picard, Rebecca Gnignati, Juliette Laffont, Ilayda Habip, Charles Wente. [Image text:] PARIS NORLD More news on FRANCE24.COM THE 2026 DEBATE