Lacking a powerful technology sector of its own, the European Union has instead tried to carve out a space in the digital economy as the world's regulatory superpower, leading the charge on privacy rights and data protection by leveraging its enormous single market against Goliaths like Google and Facebook. But a number of recent examples have made it clear that for Europe, increasingly, that is not enough. The rapid pace of technological change -- including artificial intelligence and facial recognition -- is mingling ever more with national security concerns that European leaders have been slow to grasp and respond to, analysts say. As global technology shapes up into a battleground between China and the United States, Europe is finding it harder to set the rules of the road while others in Beijing and Washington are in the diver's seat. "Europe needs to get its act together," said Marietje Schaake, international policy director at the Cyber Policy Center of Stanford University and a former member of the European Parliament. "I worry the tempo is too slow for the pace at which changes are forthcoming."