Ukraine's drone strikes damage Russian data centres

Summarised from 2 outlets · Updated 22 Oct, 05:32 · Archive

Ukrainian drone attacks this month damaged data centres for Yandex, Sberbank and VKontakte, causing widespread service disruptions across Russia.

Ukrainian drone attacks this month struck data centres for tech giant Yandex, Russia's biggest bank Sberbank, and social media platform VKontakte. The three companies have not disclosed the full extent of the damage, but people and businesses across Russia have reported widespread and lasting interruptions to cloud services.

The disruptions affected banking, e-commerce, geolocation and ride-hailing services across the country. Yandex's virtual assistant Alisa and multimodal AI chatbots also experienced outages. The impact extended to Russia's judicial system, with arbitration courts reportedly forced to cancel or postpone sessions and losing database access.

Most experts predict repairing the damage could take months or years. Mikhail Klimarev, head of the Internet Protection Society activist group, said the strikes set 'Russia far behind in the AI race'. The data centre attacks form part of a broader pattern, with both sides targeting each other's vital infrastructure during the 4.5-year full-scale invasion. Russian missiles and drones have pummelled Ukraine's power grid and other key sites.

How it is being reported

• Ukraine's strikes on Russian data centers disrupt key services and derail AI researchRussia prides itself on its digital advances — from an extensive e-commerce services sector to ambitious plans for developing artificial intelligence.Clickorlando · 22 Oct, 05:04
• Ukraine's strikes on Russian data centers disrupt key services and derail AI researchRussia prides itself on its digital advances — from an extensive e-commerce services sector to ambitious plans for developing artificial intelligence.News4Jax · 22 Oct, 05:04

In this story: Ukraine · Russia · Yandex · Sberbank · VKontakte · Mikhail Klimarev

This summary was written by AI from the headlines and standfirsts above, and states as fact only what at least two outlets report. How we use AI · Report a problem