Ars Technica says drone strikes exposed Russia’s digital fragility
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Ukrainian drone strikes hit two Yandex data centers: one in the Kaluga region, with a maximum capacity of 63 megawatts, and another in Vladimir, where the company suspended operations, according to BBC News. The Vladimir facility houses the Galushkin supercomputer, which delivers 20.64 petaflops and ranked 134th on the Top 500 list, Ars Technica reports.
Ars Technica says the damage reportedly caused interruptions to Russian payment apps and digital banking, e-commerce, streaming, ride-hailing, food delivery, mapping and navigation services. Yandex also holds about 70 percent of Russia’s search market, while its cloud service serves large companies, according to The Moscow Times. Russian military bloggers, including Ratio Militaris and Artjockey, identify the centralization as a vulnerability and say Russia’s “Sovereign Internet Law,” passed in 2019, makes it harder to build backup systems outside the country.
Why it matters · editorial interpretation
The reported disruptions suggest that concentrating digital services in a few data centers can broaden the impact of a physical attack. The assessment by Russian military bloggers also raises questions about how the “Sovereign Internet” law affects the creation of backup systems within the country.
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