As a CIO, your mandate has evolved. The boardroom discussion has shifted to the challenge of digital sovereignty, and your most critical and actionable part of that mandate is achieving data sovereignty: proving with certainty where your data lives, who can touch it, and why.

This playbook is a practical guide to achieving exactly that within the Google ecosystem, using Google Workspace Assured Controls to answer three foundational questions:

• Where is our sensitive data stored and processed?
• Who can access it, and under what circumstances?
• How can we prove our data governance policies are being enforced?

A CIO’s Toolkit for Data Control

Assured Controls translates complex regulatory demands into a manageable set of technical capabilities.

• Enforce Human-in-the-Loop Access Control: Move from trusting policy to enforcing it. Access Approvals creates a digital lockbox, requiring your explicit, logged approval before Google support can access your data. For the most stringent needs, Access Management lets you proactively restrict the pool of eligible support personnel based on their geography (U.S. Persons only) or background-check status (CJIS).
• Prove Data Residency: Answer the “where” question with auditable certainty. Assured Data Regions provides verifiable reporting that your data is stored and processed within designated geographic boundaries (U.S. or EU), a non-negotiable for regulations like GDPR.
• Achieve Ultimate Data Privacy: For the most sensitive data, Client-Side Encryption (CSE) gives your organization sole control over encryption keys, rendering data indecipherable to Google. However, this disables server-side functions like AI and search on encrypted content. Assured Controls is the ideal framework for organizations that find this trade-off unacceptable and prefer to maintain full platform functionality while controlling provider access.
• Achieve Ultimate Data Privacy with Client-Side Encryption (CSE): For your most sensitive data, CSE gives your organization sole control over encryption keys, rendering data indecipherable to Google. With Assured Controls, you can enforce CSE by default for specific users, which is critical for two key use cases:
  • Export Control (ITAR/EAR): If your teams handle ITAR data, there is a contractual obligation to store it in Google Workspace only when it is protected by CSE. Without Assured Controls, there is no mechanism to enforce this, risking non-compliance and severe penalties.
  • Intellectual Property Protection: Use CSE to keep your most valuable R&D data private—even from Google—creating an essential layer of protection from competitors and foreign governments.

The Strategic ROI of Data Control

This is more than a compliance checkbox; it’s a strategic decision that delivers a competitive advantage.

• Consolidate Your Security Stack: Assured Controls can replace or reduce reliance on standalone solutions for encryption, data governance, and CASB functions. The financial impact is significant. A 2023 Forrester Total Economic Impact™ study found that a composite organization moving to Google Workspace achieved a 336% Return on Investment (ROI) $1.8 Million in Savings over three years by retiring legacy security solutions.
• Innovate Without Compromise: Google provides these controls within its single, global commercial cloud. This avoids the feature lag common in segregated “government clouds.” Your regulated users get the same cutting-edge AI tools as commercial customers without compromising your compliance posture.
• Mitigate Quantifiable Risk: Many data regulations include stiff financial penalties. Investing in enforceable data controls is an insurance policy against catastrophic fines.

Is Assured Controls Right for You?

While Google Workspace Enterprise Plus offers a strong security baseline, Assured Controls is essential for sovereignty-conscious customers. You should strongly consider it if your organization:

• Handles Export-Controlled Data: Works with U.S. defense, aerospace, or other sectors that require compliance with ITAR or EAR regulations.
• Operates in Highly-Regulated Industries: Includes public sector agencies, finance, and healthcare, where data handling is strictly governed.
• Manages High-Value Intellectual Property: Needs to protect sensitive R&D, patents, or trade secrets from corporate and state-sponsored espionage.
• Is a Global, Multinational Business: Works with government entities across the globe and must adapt to the data sovereignty laws of each country.

Enterprise Plus vs. Assured Controls: What’s the Difference?

Enterprise Plus provides a foundation for data sovereignty, but Assured Controls unlocks the crucial enforcement and reporting capabilities required by regulated organizations. The table below highlights the key features available only with Assured Controls.

A 3-Step Implementation Framework

A successful deployment is a strategic project that requires niche expertise.

1. Map Your Needs: Identify your specific compliance drivers (ITAR, CJIS, GDPR) and map them to the required controls. Most will require the Assured Controls Plus tier, so it is important to discuss with your Google Workspace partner.

2. Build the Business Case: Frame the additional investment not just as a compliance requirement, but as a strategic move for financial and operational efficiency. Quantify the direct Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) savings gained by retiring redundant, single-purpose tools for encryption, governance, and access control. Then, calculate the significant ‘soft’ savings in administrative overhead, recognizing that consolidating security into a single console frees up your skilled personnel for higher-value initiatives.

3. Partner for Success: Engage a certified partner like Dito. We bring direct experience in navigating Google’s prescriptive guidance for regimes like IL4 and CISA baselines. We translate your regulatory map into a precise technical configuration, accelerating your time-to-compliance while your team focuses on its core mission.

Security can’t be a bolt-on, and compliance can’t mean compromise. Assured Controls Plus acts as the comprehensive security framework working seamlessly within Google Workspace to ensure that you meet your most demanding obligations.

It provides the definitive answers to the board’s toughest questions by giving you direct control over who can access your data through Access Management, and when they can access it via Access Approvals. It allows you to enforce Client-side encryption for users handling your most sensitive IP and ITAR-controlled data, helping you meet stringent requirements for CJIS, IL4, and more.

Ultimately, this integrated approach is the key strategic advantage. Instead of managing a separate, feature-lagging government cloud environment, you provide your entire organization with a single, secure, and compliant infrastructure. Your teams get the full power of Google’s real-time collaboration and AI tools, and you get the assurance of a platform built for the highest levels of security and data control, with no compromises.

Your Next Step

Understanding the theory is one thing; applying it to your unique environment is the critical next step.

Schedule a complimentary compliance workshop with a specialist to help map your requirements to the Assured Controls framework and build a preliminary business case for your stakeholders.