Banking, payments services disrupted after Amazon UAE data centers hit in drone strikes

A series of drone strikes targeting Amazon Web Services' data centers in the United Arab Emirates has led to significant outages affecting various apps and digital services in the region. The attacks, which occurred over the weekend, impacted two AWS facilities in the UAE and one in Bahrain, forcing them offline. As a result of these disruptions, numerous consumer applications, including the popular delivery and ride-hailing service Careem, along with payment platforms Alaan and Hubpay, experienced notable outages. Banking institutions such as ADCB and Emirates NBD, along with enterprise software providers like Snowflake, reported issues stemming from the compromised AWS infrastructure. The situation escalated following joint military actions by the U.S. and Israel against Iran, which included the targeted killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. This led to a series of retaliatory strikes by Tehran, contributing to increased regional instability and the targeting of critical infrastructure, including data centers and oil facilities. AWS updated its Health Dashboard, indicating that the disruptions were ongoing. "We are making progress on recovery efforts across multiple workstreams," the company stated on Tuesday morning, advising clients in the Middle East to migrate workloads to alternative AWS regions as a precaution. In a notice on their website, Alaan acknowledged that their mobile and web applications were affected by a "critical AWS outage due to the ongoing regional situation," although the message was later removed. ADCB confirmed via Twitter that their mobile banking app and contact center services were temporarily unavailable due to the regional IT disruptions. Meanwhile, Emirates NBD reported that its phone banking services were impacted but resumed normal operation by Tuesday. Snowflake's incident report highlighted continued connectivity issues in the region until power problems were resolved. Investing app Sarwa also faced service disruptions but announced that their core services were restored by Tuesday. Hubpay informed users of potential login difficulties during the outages, while Careem's services were fully restored, according to CEO Mudassir Sheikha. The drone strikes resulted in physical damage to AWS facilities, disrupting power delivery and necessitating fire suppression measures that caused additional water damage. As local providers rushed to restore services, the repercussions were felt globally, with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz triggering alarm in energy markets. U.S. stock markets opened significantly lower, with European and Asian markets also declining, as oil prices surged amid concerns of a potential energy supply crisis.