Is PH data sovereignty at risk on the blockchain?

By TechWatch PH

During the House budget hearing for the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) held recently, Rep. Brian Poe-Llamanzares sounded the alarm over the government’s dependence on foreign servers.

Citing figures that show about 90 percent of government data is stored overseas, mainly in Singapore, Poe-Llamanzares warned that this poses a serious national security and sovereignty risk. He urged the DICT to prioritize building local government-owned data centers to ensure that sensitive information remains under Philippine jurisdiction.

Poe-Llamanzares expressed strong support for the DICT’s ongoing data sovereignty initiative, which seeks to host and manage government data within the country. He said the move would not only enhance cybersecurity but also cut the long-term costs of renting foreign cloud services. The lawmaker emphasized that protecting the nation’s data is as crucial as defending its borders, an issue that requires both funding and political will.

Also, Brian Poe‑Llamanzares, together with the DICT, appeared at a press conference alongside Polygon, signaling support for placing the national budget on-chain using Polygon technology.

However, this move conflicts with the DICT’s broader push for data sovereignty, namely, the goal of keeping government data under Philippine jurisdiction and control. Hosting budget data on Polygon’s blockchain introduces questions about where data nodes may be located, who governs them, and if foreign infrastructure or governance regimes may come into play.

As a result, what was presented as a transparency initiative may also raise concerns about alignment with the DICT’s data-sovereignty agenda.

So which is it? A step forward, or a step into danger?

It’s the kind of confusion that happens when officials are quick to jump on buzzwords without weighing the consequences. Blockchain sounds promising, but who controls it, and what does the country give up in return?

Even private tech companies are now calling for tighter data controls and national storage. Yet in the same events where executives call for the immediate passage of the law on data sovereignty, the DICT, the agency in charge of securing government systems, is openly backing a global blockchain network to handle state records.

Are these people, including Poe-Llamanzares, being misinformed, or is the government sprinting into digital reform without a clear map?

What we’re seeing isn’t digital reform, it’s digital confusion. The left hand of government, through DICT, is talking about sovereignty, while the right hand is handing over data to a foreign chain.

The buzzwords like “blockchain,” “transparency,” “innovation,” and “data sovereignty” sound good in press conferences, but they can’t hide the contradiction. If the Philippines can’t even decide who should hold its own information, then all the talk of sovereignty is just theater.

The question is, can data sovereignty exist in Polygon? Yes, but only under strict conditions on how the country use it and what government put on it.

Data sovereignty can still be achieved but only if the Philippine government owns the nodes, controls the governance, and keeps the data inside national borders. Otherwise, it’s not sovereignty, it’s outsourcing with better marketing.

Until our leaders understand that true digital independence means owning both the data and the infrastructure, every “modernization” project risks becoming another surrender, this time, not of land or resources, but of the nation’s digital soul.