Why Iran targeted Amazon data centres?
Atlanta: Before dawn on March 1, 2026, Iranian Shahed drones struck two Amazon Web Services data centres in the United Arab Emirates.
A third commercial data centre in Bahrain was hit, though it is less clear whether it was deliberately targeted. This is the first time that a country has deliberately targeted commercial data centres during wartime.
Iran’s state media issued a statement on March 31 that it will target American companies, including Microsoft, Google, Apple, Meta, Oracle, Intel, HP, IBM, Cisco, Dell, Palantir and Nvidia.
The Financial Times reported that an additional Iranian drone struck an Amazon data centre in Bahrain on April 1. And Iranian state media claimed that Iranian forces attacked an Oracle data centre in Dubai on April 2.
Iran has also been on the receiving end of such attacks. A data centre in Tehran operated by Iran’s state-run Bank Sepah was struck by a missile – apparently fired by US or Israeli forces – on March 11, according to a report in The Jerusalem Post.
Data centres have been targets of espionage and cyberattacks in the past, notably when Ukrainian hackers destroyed data stored in a Russian military-affiliated data centre in 2024.
These strikes in the Persian Gulf region, however, were physical attacks. Drones damaged buildings.
Advances in artificial intelligence have increased the importance of data centres. The US military, in particular, has made great use of AI systems for decision support in its attacks on Iran and Venezuela.
Given how important data centres are,
Iranian forces could be targeting the infrastructure that Iran’s leaders believe is supporting strikes on Iran.
It is not altogether clear that these particular data centres were used by the US military. Instead, the attacks may have been part of a broader effort to punish the United Arab Emirates for its ties with the US
In my experience as a PhD candidate at Georgia Tech studying how technology drives changes in international security, I don’t think the attacks signal any significant change in the
nature of warfare. But they are forcing nations to recognise that data centres are targets of war – even if they don’t directly support military operations.
The United States military is increasingly incorporating advanced AI capabilities into its decision support systems. From the operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to supporting military strikes against Iran, the US has been using AI, especially Anthropic’s Claude, for intelligence analysis and operational support.agencies
