Putin’s decree now permits a special Russian commission to authorize foreign data center use with Federal Security Service consultation, reversing the “Sovereign Internet Law” that barred Russian firms from overseas cloud infrastructure.
Russia’s hyper-centralized digital ecosystem, dominated by Yandex, proved vulnerable when Ukrainian drone strikes hit key data centers, disrupting payment apps, e‑commerce, streaming, ride‑hailing and food‑delivery services. Yandex relocated all three main supercomputers after strikes targeted its AI facilities.
By contrast, Ukraine’s decentralized services have remained resilient; the government dispersed energy and telecom nodes and buried infrastructure underground. Amazon and Microsoft helped migrate critical government resources to European cloud regions after the February 2022 invasion, while SpaceX’s Starlink terminals — funded by the U.S., Poland and Germany — provide backup communications.
Source: Ars Technica · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing