America needs an offline mode

Tue, 13 Oct 2026 11:22:39 -0400

Between October 8 and 11, 2026, Ukrainian strikes hit three data centers operated by Yandex, one of Russia’s biggest tech companies. These were physical server halls, concrete, generators, and cooling towers, the actual bricks and mortar behind search, apps, and cloud hosting. Yandex admitted the damage was severe, shut the facilities down, and gave no timeline for restoring the equipment.

Social media did what it always does: it celebrated a clean moral victory. People cheered reports that Russian bots were offline, imagining a few blown-up buildings had miraculously scrubbed the internet of manufactured outrage. On October 12, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy pointed to fewer bots and less hate on major platforms. Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation reported that automated propaganda activity dropped by roughly half for about twelve hours before operators adapted and traffic climbed back.

Sovereignty on Notes from the Rabbit Hole

America needs an offline mode