EU Sovereignty Score
Self-hosted / open sourceStorage & BackupHeadquarters: DE

rdiff-backup: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

rdiff-backup is a command-line backup tool that works locally or over a network. The backup directory stays a mirror of the source, while older versions of changed files are kept as reverse differences, so earlier states can be restored. When writing to another system it sends only the differences, which saves bandwidth. A restore reproduces permissions, ownership, timestamps and links. It runs on Linux, macOS and Windows, and for remote use the documentation recommends SSH.

rdiff-backup is open source under the GNU GPL v2. Its README states that no company backs the development; volunteers work on it. The project website names three lead developers. The one who took over leadership in 2019 states on a personal site that he lives in Germany, and another core developer's public profile shows Canada. You install it on your own systems and decide where backups are stored, so no vendor receives your data.

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Sovereignty score
94 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign
  • Jurisdiction SOV-2100
    Headquartered in the EU: European law applies
  • Data residency SOV-3100
    EU-only hosting
  • Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-390
    Self-hostable: encryption keys under your own control
  • Freedom from lock-in SOV-680
    Open source: low switching costs
  • Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-6100
    Source code auditable, forkable and self-hostable

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 14, 2026
Headquarters
DE (EU)Verified by hand
Sovereignty model
Open-source, distributedVerified by hand
Data hosting
EUVerified by hand
Open-source
YesVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant
YesVendor-stated
Category
Storage & Backup
Type
Product
Website
rdiff-backup.net ↗

How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to rdiff-backup

The European alternatives to rdiff-backup come from our knowledge base of over 8,400 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

38 European Storage & Backup 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 rdiff-backup

rdiff-backup is headquartered in DE and therefore falls under European law: the GDPR, NIS2 and the Data Act. No foreign legislation can compel access to your data.

Data is hosted exclusively in the EU, so rdiff-backup scores best on data residency.

rdiff-backup is open source. You can audit the source code, self-host the software and keep the encryption keys under your own control. Switching is easier because data and software are not tied to a single party.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs rdiff-backup 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 rdiff-backup?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to rdiff-backup include Acronis, Atempo and Bacula Systems. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to rdiff-backup?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to rdiff-backup include Bacula Systems, Bareos and BorgBackup. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is rdiff-backup GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

rdiff-backup is headquartered in DE (EU) and hosts data in EU. It is also open-source, so you can self-host it. That makes rdiff-backup an EU-sovereign choice in its own right; the EU alternatives on this page are comparable European tools.

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 14, 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

In the changelog

Earlier changes to this page, as listed in the public changelog.

Digital sovereignty in Storage & Backup

Storage & Backup: Business storage, backup solutions, object storage and data recovery. 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 rdiff-backup — GDPR-compliant & EU-hosted · EU Sovereignty Score