How Ukraine's attacks on data centers disrupted taxis, shopping and businesses in Russia

Ukrainian drone attacks on three data centers operated by Russia's Yandex are said to take months to repair and have caused widespread disruption to daily life across Russia and other countries where the sprawling tech company operates.

Large companies that use Yandex's cloud computing services were affected, from grocery retail chains Magnit and Lenta to fashion chain Lamoda. Some people looking for sex or romance on the dating site Twinby were also disappointed.

Others were unable to ride the Yandex Go taxi app or access their money on Yandex Pay, which is used by tens of millions of Russians every day. Yandex's email service was also affected.

Although a number of key services were restored by October 12, the attacks highlighted a vulnerability that technology industry operators are trying to address.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on October 13 that Yandex “is facing difficulties and of course the issue is being discussed by the government.” He added that Yandex is taking “urgent steps to address the consequences of the attack.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said that the attacks on three Yandex sites were a response to Russian attacks on Ukrainian centers that affected internet and mobile services in Ukraine.

Yandex is often described as the “Google of Russia,” although it actually sold its search engine as part of an asset split in 2024 and offers other services, such as ride-sharing and food delivery, that Google does not offer.

Yandex has five data centers in Russia, according to a company report for 2025.

The three main data centers that were hit are Sasovo, Kaluga, and Vladimir. In addition, there are smaller data centers in Mytishchi and Ivanteyevka, both in the Moscow region. Yandex opened a second data center in Vladimir in 2025, which some media reports have counted separately, bringing the total to six across the country.

Serhiy Petrenko, former head of Yandex in Ukraine, told Current Time that “about 80 percent of Russia’s data centers are located in Moscow and the Moscow region. So, of course, attacks there will continue and, of course, cause more and more damage.”

He added that Yandex had lost "half or more of its capacity" and "cannot continue to operate with the same functionality."

Other experts noted that Russia's data centers were more centralized than Ukraine's and therefore more vulnerable.

Nikolay Mitrokhin, a researcher at the Center for East European Studies at the University of Bremen, wrote on social media that 95 percent of Russia's data centers were within range of Ukrainian drones.

Kiev, he added, had "every ability to return Russia to the analog era."

A statement from Yandex after the first two attacks said: "Data centers are the iron heart of Yandex," adding that "millions of users control traffic and plan routes, listen to music, watch movies, order food and get answers to their questions. Our technology helps hundreds of thousands of companies run their businesses."

He added that workers were "working day and night" to get things back on track. Russian media reported that this could take months, with Western sanctions limiting the supply of some necessary materials and equipment.

"In recent days, the price of servers and data processing equipment in Russia has increased by 10-15 percent," Eldar Murtazin, an analyst at Mobile Research Group, told the independent online media outlet Fontanka.

The affected sites include the locations of three Yandex supercomputers, named Chervonenkis, Lyapunov and Galushkin, although the company did not say whether they were damaged.

Beyond Russia

Yandex is an international player that reported global revenue last year of about $11 billion, with offices in several former Soviet countries and for-hire transportation services elsewhere in Europe and Africa.

Some of these services appear to have been affected following the attacks in Ukraine.

In Moldova, for example, Yandex Go holds about 60 percent of the taxi market. On October 12-13, the company notified users that it was experiencing technical problems without stating the cause.

The difficulties came as the company was also embroiled in a court battle over its refusal to disclose data about drivers using its taxi app. Court filings obtained by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Moldova showed that the case involved about $7.8 million in income, which allegedly flowed directly into banks in Dubai and Kazakhstan without being taxed before leaving the country.

Delays and difficulties for drivers and passengers were also reported in Kazakhstan, raising broader concerns about the country's dependence on Russian digital infrastructure and the potential vulnerability of essential services to disruptions caused by the war.

Similar problems were also reported in Armenia and Belarus, while Yandex in Serbia told Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty's Balkan Service that its taxi app there "may be experiencing difficulties at the moment."

“This is a lesson for countries like Kazakhstan and Armenia, which depend heavily on Yandex” for taxi and mapping services, digital rights activist Sarkis Darbinian told Current Time.

"For Yandex this means there will be no expansion. On the contrary, its sphere of influence will shrink and foreign users will move away from services that have disappointed them."