In brief
Russian internet giant Yandex is grappling with outages after Ukrainian drones hit two of its critical data centres. The strikes caused the Sasovo hub to shut down entirely and knocked out part of a large Kaluga facility, hampering AI chat and smart‑home operations. Yandex says teams are working day and night to restore services, but no firm timeline is available. The attacks are part of a larger cyber‑physical conflict, with each side targeting rivals’ digital infrastructure.
Ukrainian drones have put Yandex’s leading data centers under fire, leaving the Russian search engine in a working emergency.
Yandex, often dubbed “Russia’s Google,” operates a network that powers millions of searches, food‑delivery orders and taxi bookings. Two of its five data centres – the Sasovo hub in the Ryazan region and a massive Kaluga plant – were struck over the past two days, crippling services across the country.
The Sasovo site suffered “serious damage,” causing a total shut‑down, while the Kaluga center lost a portion of its infrastructure. This leaves Yandex’s AI chatbot and smart‑home devices offline for now, while employees work around the clock to repair the damage.
President Zelensky said the attacks are retaliation for Russian strikes on Ukrainian data facilities, and Ukraine claims they target civilian infrastructure. Moscow counters that the sites house military intelligence assets.
With winter approaching, the situation raises concerns about the resilience of digital services in conflict zones and highlights how cyber‑physical attacks can ripple across societies.
