Drone attacks on Yandex servers disrupted payment systems and services across multiple countries
Ukrainian drones hit three data centers belonging to the Russian internet company Yandex between October 8 and 11, 2026. The strikes disrupted cloud infrastructure, payment systems, and transportation applications throughout Russia, Central Asia, and the Caucasus. This was reported by Hudson Institute citing Telegraph, according to the portal PromPolitInform.
The destruction of these facilities exposed a critical vulnerability at the heart of Moscow’s digital economy due to the concentration of essential services in few physical locations. The first strike targeted the Sasovo data center southeast of Moscow on October 8, a facility housing two supercomputers. The following day, Ukraine hit a larger complex in the Kaluga region, and on October 11, a third facility near Vladimir was struck.
Large-scale service disruptions
Yandex officially acknowledged that operations at Sasovo had stopped entirely and that its infrastructure in Kaluga and Vladimir had been disabled. The outages impacted 80 Yandex services, including the Alisa voice assistant, Yandex Music, smart-home applications, and cloud storage. Users reported immediate difficulties transferring funds, accessing ride-hailing services, and retrieving verification messages through Yandex Mail.
Consequences for business and the region
The disruptions also affected businesses and customers throughout Central Asia and the Caucasus who depend on the company’s cloud infrastructure. Outages were reported in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Armenia, pushing customers toward competing transport platforms. Information-technology market participants estimate that replacing the destroyed equipment could take Yandex at least six months.
Illustrative photo: Sever123 / CC BY-SA 3.0
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