- Czech MEP Tomas Zdehovski said yes sudden drop in online activity about the German party Alternative for Germany (AfD) after the attack on Russian data centers "says a lot", with the remark "if it is confirmed".
- Ukrainian drones hit three data centers of the Russian company Yandex in Sasovo, Kaluga and Vladimir from October 8 to 11.
- Internet monitoring networks are recording a drastic drop in Yandex traffic, and the company has confirmed damage and service interruptions.
- Independent confirmation that the decline in activity around the AfD is linked to these attacks has not been released.
What happened
Zdehovski wrote alongside graphs showing the drop in traffic that it was "significant" if it was confirmed that Russian data centers were affected and online activity around the AfD dropped sharply. In later posts, he stated that Yandex's data centers were affected and that the data indicated a drastic drop in bot traffic from his network, and that if Kremlin troll farms were also affected, "real people" could get more space on social networks.
Yandex said that a drone damaged a data center in Sasovo (Ryazan region) on the night between October 7 and 8, which caused a fire and suspension of work, then in Kaluga on October 9, where several modules were completely disabled, and then in Vladimir, where work was completely suspended. The governor of Kalushka region said that nine people were injured.
NetBlocks noted that the traffic of Yandex Cloud fell to about 30 percent of the usual level, and Yandex to about 63 percent, while services used by, among others, Russian Railways and operator MegaFon were disrupted. The company's shares fell around four percent on the Moscow Stock Exchange.
The connection between these attacks and the reduced activity around the AfD is so far based on Zdehovski and the posts on social networks, without independent analysis to confirm it.
Who's who in this story?
Since 2014, Zdehovski has been an MEP from the Czech KDU-ČSL, a member of the European People's Party, and specializes in crisis communication, media analysis and budget control.
Yandex is a Russian technology company that is often called the "Russian Google" because of its search engine and services, and is significantly involved in the development of artificial intelligence in Russia. The attacks on its data centers are described as Kiev's response to Russian strikes on Ukrainian data centers
Russia has previously been accused of online influence campaigns in Europe, including Germany, using fake accounts.
Why is this important?
If it turned out that much of the online activity around a party depended on bots on Russian infrastructure, it would change how its actual support on the networks is interpreted.
It is important for citizens to distinguish real content from artificially generated traffic, and for journalists and researchers not to draw conclusions without analyzing the data.
The case also shows that infrastructure for digital services becomes a target in war, with consequences that go beyond military objectives.
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