Ukraine's Drone Strikes Take Out Three of Yandex's Largest Data Centers
Ukrainian drone strikes knocked out three of the largest data centers owned by Russian tech giant Yandex within several days, and Russia's digital services are facing widespread outages, Ars Technica reports.
Russia had begun attacking Ukrainian data centers and telecommunications infrastructure itself, and Ars writes that it apparently failed to prepare for possible retaliation. That asymmetry — hitting another country's networks while leaving your own concentrated and exposed — is the whole story here.
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The opening round came in late September, when Russian strikes targeted Ukrainian data centers and mobile phone networks; Ars reports those attacks temporarily disrupted internet and cell service for up to 100,000 households in Kyiv.
The uncomfortable implication is that centralisation bought scale and cost resilience: the same handful of facilities that make a digital economy efficient also make a short list of targets.