Russian allies like North Korea, Belarus, and Iran can't offer much in the way of digital infrastructure support. Even China, which has been aiding Russia throughout the conflict, can't help much here. While it is making strides in building out its compute network for AI infrastructure, it runs a relatively walled-garden form of the internet. Integrating Russian applications with that would be complex and time-consuming.
All of this suggests that if Ukraine continues to hit Russian data centers, there's a real potential that Russian citizens and its military could lose access to digital services that have become ubiquitous in 21st-century life.
The effect that would have on Russian society and its war-fighting goals remains unclear, but it would have an impact.
Losing its most capable data centers alongside sanctions that prevent it from taking advantage of the AI boom that's buoying many other global economies could severely hamper Russian efforts to modernize its economy.
While the U.S., EU, and China are building out hundreds of billions of dollars worth of data centers to power the next generation of artificial intelligence models, Russia is struggling to hold on to what it's got. With major data centers now in Ukraine's sights, including those scheduled for expansion, Russia could see its digital future wiped away in a matter of months.
With even medium-tier data centers often taking years to build, even with ready access to the hardware to power them, Russia could be on the cusp of falling decades behind its contemporaries.
One highly publicized impact of these strikes on Yandex data centers has been a reduction in automated online activity from Russia. While that does appear to have reduced bot traffic slightly , particularly around support for far-right parties, it may not be as impactful as some initial reports claim, as Cloudflare has published a report stating that many of the bots have merely migrated to other hosts, reducing, but not eliminating, the bots themselves.
Journalist Ilya Lozovsky posted a lengthy explanation on Twitter/X about why Russian bots haven't been as disrupted as some have claimed, highlighting that bot activity hasn't fallen off as much as legitimate web crawlers and search functions at Yandex.
Last night I was struck — really, almost radicalized — watching in real time as experts at the heights of their careers boosted emotionally satisfying narratives that were pretty much entirely wrong. https://t.co/8WoMQvt4xh October 12, 2026
But while Russian bots haven't gone dark, there are several reports of reduced online activity among far-right groups, particularly those supporting prominent far-right politicians.
Posts supporting the AFD in Germany don't appear as impacted as initial claims suggested — the chart doing the rounds has clear errors in it, and German tech outlet Rohtext claims online discourse in general went down, rather than specific parties being impacted.
What these strikes have done, though, is highlight a clear and present weakness in Russia's modern society, military, and economy. If Ukraine can continue its strikes against Russian data centers, it may well bring key public services to their knees, as well as cripple Russia's ability to compete in modern digital services beyond the end of this war, further inhibiting the Russian economy in the future.
Jon Martindale Freelance Writer Jon Martindale is a contributing writer for Tom's Hardware. For the past 20 years, he's been writing about PC components, emerging technologies, and the latest software advances. His deep and broad journalistic experience gives him unique insights into the most exciting technology trends of today and tomorrow.
Key considerations
- Investor positioning can change fast
- Volatility remains possible near catalysts
- Macro rates and liquidity can dominate flows
Reference reading
- https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/data-centers/SPONSORED_LINK_URL
- https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/data-centers/ukrainian-drones-hit-russian-data-centers-disrupting-russian-apps-and-services-attacks-highlight-the-fragility-of-the-countrys-digital-services#main
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