Ukrainian drone strikes damage Yandex data centres and disrupt services

Ukrainian forces carried out drone attacks on three Yandex data centres in Russia on Oct. 9 and 10, targeting facilities in Sasovo, the Kaluga region and near Vladimir. Yandex said the Sasovo site was completely halted, part of the Kaluga infrastructure was disabled and the Vladimir centre was taken offline. The company announced that staff were working around the clock to restore services.

Regional authorities reported nine injuries in Kaluga and about 1,600 customers without electricity in Vladimir. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described the strikes as retaliation for Russian attacks on data centres in the Kyiv region earlier this month.

The outages affected Yandex’s suite of products, including its browser, maps, payment system and taxi-booking app. Users reported temporary loss of access to Yandex apps, and the company advised some customers to use alternative platforms. Companies that rely on Yandex Cloud, such as retailer Magnit and fast-food chain Vkusno i Tochka, also experienced disruptions.

Yandex’s FinTech division chief Dima Pirogov reassured users that funds stored in Yandex Pay were safe, noting that the money itself is not kept in the data centres. He added that restoration timelines were uncertain but that the company would continue working until services were fully restored.

Russia’s Digital Development Minister Maksut Shadayev told a State Duma committee that the government was coordinating with the Defence Ministry on measures to protect data centres, describing the attacks as unprecedented and noting industry-wide assistance to resolve the situation.

Officials indicated that replacing damaged equipment could take several months, suggesting a prolonged recovery period for the affected facilities.