Russia has struck a major data centre in Kyiv in a daytime attack that marks a sharp escalation of Moscow's campaign against Ukraine's digital infrastructure, with President Volodymyr Zelensky accusing the Kremlin of deliberately targeting the systems that keep ordinary Ukrainians connected, informed and alive.
The Russian defence ministry confirmed on Friday that its forces had hit the Datagroup data centre housed in the Inkom business centre in the Ukrainian capital, claiming the facility was supporting Ukrainian military intelligence. Verified footage of the aftermath showed damage to the building, while Datagroup said its specialists were still assessing the strike and that all services continued to operate from backup sites.
A campaign against the digital backbone
The Datagroup strike is the latest and most high-profile in a series of Russian attacks on Ukraine's data and communications infrastructure. Russia's defence ministry has claimed its forces have also been targeting other data-processing and telecommunications centres, naming New-Telco, United DC, Kyivstar and Parkovyi among them.
Monitoring group NetBlocks reported partial connectivity losses across several providers, including Kyiv Link, Pautina, Utels and Crazy Network, with the latter reporting outages affecting customers in Kyiv and parts of the Vinnytsia and Khmelnytskyi regions. About 100,000 households in Kyiv and the surrounding region suffered internet outages on Wednesday, according to the BBC.
The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) has reported that since mid-September, Russian forces have been systematically targeting data centres and telecommunications infrastructure in Kyiv, with Ukrainian internet service providers confirming damage and communications disruption. The institute noted, however, that Ukrainian authorities had not reported evidence that the strikes had disrupted military or state communications.
Claims of a military target, cries of terror
Moscow insists the Datagroup facility was a legitimate target. Russia's defence ministry said the centre was involved in processing and communicating intelligence data for Ukraine's armed forces, and, according to the Tass news agency, claimed the site provided support for the Starlink satellite systems used by Ukraine's military. Those specific claims have not been independently verified.
Kyiv has rejected the military-target framing outright. Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Russia's actions were calculated to disrupt the flow of "life-saving information," pointing out that rapid alerts about missile and drone threats save lives. "This is critical civilian infrastructure. It is not a military target," he said.
Zelensky said Russia was constantly expanding its "escalation operation," naming American and other businesses, data centres and internet providers as targets. "All this affects people's ability to stay connected, study, work," he said, arguing that for Moscow, "all ordinary life is simply a target." He called on the world to respond so that Russia "feels the response to its terror."
The strikes on Friday also killed and wounded civilians. Kyiv Mayor Vitaliy Klitschko said the assaults resulted in seven fatalities and 59 injuries. Zelensky reported that a Russian drone struck an office building in the Solomianskyi district, killing four people and injuring seven, including a child, and said a warehouse used by McDonald's was also hit — "an attack drone, against ordinary food products."
Ukraine's digital resilience
Ukraine's internet network is highly decentralized, which officials say limits the damage Russia can inflict. Serhii Beskrestnov, an adviser to Zelensky on defence technologies, acknowledged there could be "local disruptions" and warned that internet service costs might rise to cover repairs — but insisted the country would "not be left without internet access."
The resilience has deep roots. The Center for Strategic and International Studies has documented how Ukraine migrated significant parts of its digital infrastructure to public cloud systems and data centres outside the country, helping maintain government and digital services despite years of Russian cyber and physical attacks. Ukraine's Delta situational-awareness system gathers battlefield data from multiple sources and processes it through cloud infrastructure to give commanders a real-time operational picture.
That resilience is now being tested as Russia widens its target list. The same Friday strike wave also saw the Russian defence ministry claim attacks on port infrastructure in Reni on the Danube river and on cargo vessels in the Odesa region — a sign, Ukrainian officials say, that Moscow's campaign is spreading from the battlefield to the very systems that keep the country's economy and society functioning.
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