Amazon has announced that, more than six months after the drone attacks, it can no longer recover data from its cloud data centres in Bahrain. In the UAE, data stored solely at one of the company’s three data centre clusters has also been lost.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is Amazon’s cloud computing division. Many companies, banks and applications host their data and services on its servers. On Tuesday, September 15, Amazon said on its service status page that it had reached the conclusion following a comprehensive review. The company has also informed authorities in Bahrain and the UAE.

Bahrain suffered the most severe damage. Amazon said several data centre clusters in the country were damaged, with losses exceeding the capacity of its backup systems to recover. Following the initial damage in March, Amazon urged customers to move their data to other centres. Another section went offline in April, taking the entire Bahrain network out of service. Amazon said it had exhausted all options to recover data that had not been transferred but was unsuccessful. A further update on Bahrain will be issued in early 2027.

The situation in the UAE is better. Amazon said most customers affected since March had continued operating from other centres using backups. Repairs to two other damaged sections in the UAE are still under way. Amazon has not provided a completion date but said it would issue regular updates in the coming months.

The United States and Israel launched attacks on Iran on February 28. Amazon said in March that drones had struck two of its data centres in the UAE. A drone explosion near one of its facilities in Bahrain also caused damage. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps claimed responsibility for the attacks, saying it had targeted the Bahrain facility because of Amazon’s cooperation with the US military. Reuters reported that the outages also affected the operations of some banks at the time.

The announcement came days after Reuters reported that the UAE was revising its plans. Citing six informed sources, Reuters said on September 11 that the UAE was reassessing its proposed flagship artificial intelligence data centre. The five-gigawatt project was originally planned for a large, roughly 26-square-kilometre site in Abu Dhabi. Several data centres may now be built at different locations across the UAE instead of a single large complex.

Reuters sources said the UAE was considering building some of the facilities underground. Centres housing the most sensitive data, including military information, could also be built inside mountains in Ras Al Khaimah and Fujairah. Anti-drone and missile defence systems, blast-resistant concrete and backup power supplies are also being added to the plans.

UAE technology company G42, which is leading the project, told Reuters that work was proceeding as planned. The company said the project’s details were being continuously reviewed to ensure security.