Photo Credit: Getty Images
The escalating geopolitical tensions in the Middle East have directly impacted global digital infrastructure as Amazon's cloud computing division, Amazon Web Services (AWS) confirmed that three of its facilities in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain were hit by drone strikes. The incidents occurred on Sunday morning, following weekend US and Israeli strikes against Iran. AWS initially reported "objects" hitting a UAE data center, causing "sparks and fire," and investigated power and connectivity issues at a Bahrain facility. The company confirmed on Monday that drone strikes caused the outages.
The incidents highlight the vulnerability of key technology infrastructure like data centres during military conflicts.
AWS said two UAE facilities were hit directly, ''while in Bahrain, a drone strike in close proximity to one of our facilities caused physical impacts to our infrastructure."
The company said the drones caused structural damage, disrupted power delivery to infrastructure, ''and in some cases, required fire suppression activities that resulted in additional water damage.''
The firm added that it is working quickly to restore services to the affected areas, but that it could take time ''given the nature of the physical damage involved.''
It also recommended that customers who use its services in the region back up their data and "potentially migrate workloads" to alternative AWS facilities in the rest of the world.
AWS also warned that the ongoing conflict means "the broader operating environment in the Middle East remains unpredictable.”
President Donald Trump has signalled that the US strikes on Iran could last four to five weeks but could "go far longer".
