Design Tools

Design tools store more personal data than you might expect. User research deliverables, persona documents with real customer data, screenshots of dashboards containing PII, and annotated mockups with client feedback are all commonly stored in design platforms. Additionally, collaboration metadata (who edited what, when, comments with names) constitutes personal data. If you design for clients in regulated industries like healthcare or finance, their data in your design files falls under GDPR protection.

European alternatives like Penpot offer real-time collaboration, vector editing, prototyping, and component libraries similar to Figma. Penpot is open-source and can even be self-hosted for complete data control. While Figma's plugin ecosystem and developer handoff features are more mature, European tools are rapidly closing the gap. For teams where data sovereignty is a priority, the trade-off is increasingly small.

When sharing design files with people outside the EU, you are performing a data transfer under GDPR. If the files contain any personal data, you need appropriate safeguards such as Standard Contractual Clauses. Using an EU-based design tool ensures the data at rest remains in the EU. For the sharing itself, ensure your platform supports link-based access with permissions rather than requiring external users to create accounts that might route data through non-EU servers.