Data centre operators face rising security costs from drone warfare

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Data centre drone security costs

Highlights

Data centres face escalating physical security threats from drone and missile attacks, with incidents tied to Russia, Ukraine, and Iran rising since 2022.
Operators in regions like the UAE and Saudi Arabia must invest in blast-resistant designs and decentralised campuses, increasing capital costs and complicating AI infrastructure build-outs.
In April, AWS reported permanent loss of data in Bahrain due to an Iranian strike, demonstrating that data localisation or state control does not guarantee operational resilience.

Growing military threat to digital infrastructure

As reported by Financial Times, attacks on data centre infrastructure are increasing as conflicts blur the line between civilian and military technology assets. Recent strikes involving Russia, Ukraine and Iran show that facilities supporting cloud computing, communications and digital services are becoming more prominent targets.

Military forces have long targeted communications networks and command systems, but the current wave of attacks is broadening the risk for commercial data infrastructure. The article notes that Russia reportedly hit at least one Ukrainian government data centre early in its war in 2022, while this year has brought a wider acceleration in attacks on facilities tied to internet services and cloud operations.

Another factor is scale. Data centres are becoming larger and more expensive, while relatively cheap drones and missiles can cause disruption that far exceeds their cost. That imbalance is especially significant for AI facilities, where gigawatt-scale campuses require major capital commitments and uninterrupted operations.

AI build-out faces higher design and operating burdens

Operators and governments are now reassessing whether traditional physical security measures, such as guards and perimeter fencing, are enough. New facility designs may need blast-resistant concrete, jamming equipment, missile-defence systems or underground construction, raising the cost base for future projects.

That challenge is particularly acute in the Gulf, where countries including the UAE and Saudi Arabia are seeking to position themselves as AI hubs. The text says Iran's attacks have forced the UAE to reconsider plans for a single large campus and instead look at a network of data centres, while the low-cost energy advantage that attracted developers now has to be weighed against defence spending and disruption risk.

The implications extend beyond the Gulf. Smaller and medium-sized countries pursuing so-called sovereign AI may find that local ownership or data localisation rules do not ensure resilience. The article points to Russian state control over domestic technology assets and to AWS disclosing that data stored at a Bahraini facility was permanently destroyed by an Iranian strike, underscoring that data protection is increasingly becoming a matter of physical defence as well as cybersecurity.

In our earlier article on the U.S. AI data center boom, we examined how soaring financing costs, construction delays and power constraints are putting a $10 trillion build-out under pressure. We also highlighted that only a minority of planned projects were seen as credible, as tighter capital markets, cost overruns and local pushback raise doubts about whether developers can deliver capacity on time and on budget.

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