When the Bots Went Silent

Between October 8th and 11th, 2026, Ukrainian drones struck three Yandex data centers in Russia — in Sasovo, Kaluga, and Vladimir. Two were shut down entirely. A third was severely damaged. Then something strange happened. Cloudflare data showed that automated bot traffic from Yandex’s network dropped from 88% to 0.4% — almost to zero. Zelenskyy went on television and said social media had become “easier to breathe on.” Pro-Russian accounts went quiet. The story spread: Ukraine had taken out Russia’s troll farms. Here’s the thing. That story isn’t quite right. This video explains what the Cloudflare chart actually shows, what kind of “bots” stopped, why the drop happened, and what we can and can’t conclude from the available data. Because the real story — what this attack actually revealed about Russia’s digital infrastructure — is more interesting than the bot farm narrative. And it matters more. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rejil.substack.com