Russian bloggers warn Russia’s hyper-centralized digital economy is vulnerable.

Archived version: https://archive.is/newest/https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/10/russia-was-not-ready-for-the-data-center-war-it-started-with-ukraine/


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[–] 26 points 4 days ago

From now on, in any war, datacenters will be taken out first

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  • [–] 17 points 4 days ago (5 children)

    As the Dutch say...

    Wie een kuil graaft voor een ander valt er zelf in.

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  • [–] 6 points 3 days ago (3 children)

    I'm curious to see how much damage was done to those data centers. Did the whole thing burn down, are only some crucial elements shutdown and most importantly, will the compute units be recyclable? Usually they have pretty effective fire supression systems. But they're probably not designed to withstand bombings.

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  • [–] 4 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (2 children)

    The pictures looked pretty ugly.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTJGhuWWnGo (right at the start) for Sasova. https://youtu.be/L6FMWTKk8W0?t=1287 for satellite image - half of it is completely gone, and the rest is probably not useable anymore after the fire with all the particulate all over the sensitive equipment, which will just short it out when they get power again, if they haven't already.

    Edit: here a quick screenshot:

    image

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  • [–] 1 point 3 days ago (1 child)

    Not too shabby. I guess they'll have to test the rest, it's high enough value to test each individual graphics card etc

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  • [–] 2 points 3 days ago

    Yeah, but i can clearly remember a LAN party back in the 2000s where my girlfriend at the time had the bright idea of burning anti-mosquito-candles indoor because we were under siege - it caused a monitor and 2 power brick failures within 24 hours. And this stuff is a lot more sensitive, and the fire was causing a lot more crap in the air.

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  • [–] 6 points 4 days ago

    Russians may be waiting up to six months until Yandex can replace damaged data center equipment

    Which Russians? All Yandex services are still working as far as I'm aware.

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  • [–] -4 points 3 days ago* (1 child)

    On one hand, Slava Ukraini.

    But on the other, online piracy is gonna be a bit more difficult for a while.

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