Viral Russian "bot drop" after Yandex data centre strikes mostly reflects Yandex crawlers

Left · 2Social media users have been sharing claims that Russian bot traffic, and with it automated posts on sites such as X and Facebook, fell sharply after attacks on data centres run by Yandex, the company often called "Russia's Google". 1 2 Left · 2The Verge describes the attacks as multiple Ukrainian drone strikes over the past week that took Russian data centres offline, and the Independent describes them as part of a broad Ukrainian effort to attack Russia's internet infrastructure. 2 1 Left · 2Metro reports that the strikes hit Yandex data centres in Sasovo on October 8, Kaluga on October 9 and, on Sunday, Vladimir; it says three of Yandex's four largest data centres have been knocked out. Raw Story, citing Reuters, says Yandex reported that the drone attack completely shut down its Vladimir-region centre, and that Ukraine has not officially claimed the strikes. 3 4

Left · 1Cloudflare data does show a fall in automated traffic. According to the Independent, traffic from Yandex, which normally accounts for a large share of automated traffic within Russia, dropped to nearly zero on Sunday morning and had not recovered to normal levels. 1 Left · 1Both outlets say this is not evidence of fewer social media bots. The Independent notes that Cloudflare's "bot" category covers all non-human automated traffic, including search-engine and AI-training crawlers, which Yandex operates like Google and its rivals. 1 Left · 1The Verge cites troll-farm researcher antibot4navalny, who said the chart "has nothing to do with social media" and measures requests from Yandex web crawlers. The Verge adds that, according to Cloudflare, bot activity from Russia at large remains largely unchanged. 2

Left · 1The Verge reports that another widely shared chart, posted by MEP Tomáš Zdechovský and claiming activity around Germany's AfD party plummeted after the attacks, may be AI-generated. Computer scientist Raphael Wimmer pointed to inconsistencies, including a data point dated October 15th, and the chart's source is not established. 2 Left · 1Some users have posted informal "bot tests" on X and say they see fewer automated-looking replies. The Independent says that is not necessarily broadly true and may have nothing to do with the Yandex attacks. 1 Left · 2Yandex has said it is working to restore access, and some services remained entirely offline as of Sunday. The Verge says most Yandex systems, including the Yandex Pay payment service, still appeared offline. Yandex Fintech head Dima Pirogov said the company could not yet give a restoration timeline. 1 2

Left · 1Metro reports that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told the Warsaw Security Forum it had become "a little easier to breathe" online, saying "There was less hate, less division, and fewer provocations because there were fewer bots." 3 Left · 1Metro quotes security researchers who say no link is shown: Aras Nazarova of Cybernews said a direct connection cannot be drawn because disinformation campaigns mask their source IP addresses, and Pieter Arntz of Malwarebytes said account-level activity data would be needed. Metro says Cloudflare shows Russian web traffic, human and bot, has not dipped, and that Yandex told it manipulation on social networks is against its rules. 3 Left · 1Raw Story, citing The Deep Dive, says Cloudflare Radar showed Yandex-network requests at 0.3% of the chart's peak at one point on Oct. 11, against 88.2% a week earlier, and quotes writer JP Alegre: "The chart can’t separate fewer bots from fewer working servers." 4

Left · 1Raw Story reviewed 176 replies to a White House post on X about election-fraud charges and counted 138 opposing or mocking it, 19 backing it and 19 unclassifiable; several users, including large accounts, said the "bots" were gone. Raw Story notes those posts are not evidence the claim is true. 4