EU Sovereignty Score
Non-EU vendorDNS Privacy & FilteringHeadquarters: CA

ControlD: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

Control D is a DNS security service for businesses and individuals, focused on safety, privacy and control over internet traffic. It offers DNS filtering (malware blocking and filters for websites, services, content and custom rules), traffic redirection, modern DNS protocols, multi-tenancy, analytics, admin logs, data streaming to SIEM systems and integrations. Control D started in 2021 as a spin-off from the privacy company Windscribe and is delivered as a cloud service.

The company behind the service is CONTROLD, Inc. in Toronto, Canada; no European parent company is known. Control D states that it operates locations across North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, South America and Africa and, according to the vendor, applies no logging of DNS queries tied to user identities. Its privacy policy says personal data may be transferred outside the EU and EEA on the basis of adequacy decisions or standard contractual clauses. No open-source option is described. European organisations should therefore check which locations process their DNS traffic.

See the 8 European alternatives ↓Assess your stack with ControlD pre-selected
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Sovereignty score
42 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign
  • Jurisdiction SOV-250
    Headquartered outside the EU (CA)
  • Data residency SOV-350
    Hosting inside and outside Europe (EU, US, OTHER)
  • Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-340
    Key management with a non-European vendor
  • Freedom from lock-in SOV-640
    Closed source: switching requires data migration
  • Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-630
    Closed source, runtime with the vendor

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 9, 2026
Headquarters
CA (OTHER)Verified by hand
EU adequacy decision
Yes — found adequate by the European CommissionVerified by hand
Sovereignty model
Vendor-hosted (non-EU)Verified by hand
Data hosting
EU, US, OTHERVerified by hand
Open-source
NoVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant
YesVendor-stated
Hosting signal
CONTROLD - CONTROLD INC., CA (CA)Technically measured
Category
DNS Privacy & Filtering
Type
Product
Website
controld.com ↗

The hosting signal shows the network that serves the vendor's website, often a CDN, and not necessarily where the service or your data is hosted. How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to ControlD

The European alternatives to ControlD come from our knowledge base of over 6,800 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

24 European DNS Privacy & Filtering vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with ControlD

ControlD is headquartered in CA, outside the EU. Contracts and data therefore also fall under non-European law. The GDPR applies through contractual terms, but in a conflict with local legislation you have less certainty than with a European vendor.

ControlD hosts data in EU, US, OTHER. Exactly what stays within the EU — and what does not — is defined by the vendor's data processing agreement and sub-processor list, not by a setting you control yourself; check those documents for the precise scope, including backups, logs and support access.

ControlD is closed source and hosted by the vendor. The encryption keys and the runtime sit with the vendor and switching requires data migration. Ask about bring-your-own-key, export options and open standards.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs ControlD together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to ControlD?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to ControlD include AdGuard DNS, AdGuard Home and Blocky. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to ControlD?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to ControlD include AdGuard Home, Blocky and dnscrypt-proxy. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is ControlD GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

ControlD is headquartered in CA (OTHER) and hosts data in EU, US, OTHER. The vendor states it is GDPR-compliant, but the data falls under non-EU jurisdiction. For full EU data residency the EU alternatives on this page usually offer more certainty.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 9, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Digital sovereignty in DNS Privacy & Filtering

DNS Privacy & Filtering: Privacy-friendly DNS services, ad blocking and DNS filtering. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

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8 European alternatives to ControlD — GDPR-compliant & EU-hosted · EU Sovereignty Score