In a new article published online in Geopolitics (Taylor & Francis, 2026), Samuele Fratini and Francesca Musiani (both CIS-CNRS) examine how Threema, the Swiss secure messaging platform, participates in the co-production of Swiss national identity amid rising digital geopolitics.

Combining document analysis and semi-structured interviews, the authors show how Threema’s technical architecture, randomised user IDs, metadata minimisation, Swiss data localisation, performs political work, encoding and reproducing values of neutrality, privacy, and sovereignty. The study identifies three interrelated mechanisms through which Threema materialises « Swissness »: neutrality by design, privacy by infrastructure, and institutional reception and national branding.

Bridging International Relations and Science and Technology Studies, the article reveals a bottom-up pathway to digital sovereignty in which private firms operationalise jurisdictional claims through design rather than regulation alone, highlighting both the promise and the fragility of sovereignty enacted through private-sector infrastructures.

Read the full article in Geopolitics (2026): Switzerland by Design / Full text (HAL)