Iran has declared Google, Amazon and Microsoft “legitimate targets” for attack, publishing a hit list of tech company offices and data centres in the Middle East.
The Iranian Tasnim News Agency on Wednesday said Tehran was preparing to pursue “enemy technology infrastructure”.
In a Telegram post, Tasnim listed 29 offices, data centres and research hubs owned by the seven companies in Qatar, Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.
It also named the US tech companies Nvidia, Palantir, IBM and Oracle as targets for attack.
“As the regional war expands into an infrastructure war, the scope of Iran’s legitimate targets gradually broadens,” Tasnim said in a post titled “Iran’s new targets”.
Last week, Amazon data centres in the UAE and Bahrain were attacked by Iranian drones.
The locations listed include not just data centres but advertising sales offices and research centres in busy cities.
The companies have not yet said if they have taken steps to protect staff, close offices or otherwise respond to the threat. Amazon evacuated employees from a damaged data centre last week.
Iran also threatened to attack banks and other financial institutions on Wednesday, saying that people should stay outside a one-kilometre radius.
Many of the tech companies named by Iran have significant operations in the Middle East, including several regional data centres, as governments and businesses demand local data storage, as well as major operations in Israel, a cybersecurity hub.
Nvidia has around 5,000 staff in Israel and spent $7bn (£5.2bn) acquiring the Israeli start-up Mellanox in 2019. Google has a Doha data centre region, and Microsoft has said it plans to open a data centre in Saudi Arabia by the end of the year.
Last week’s attacks against Amazon are believed to be the first military attacks against a US tech company’s data centres.
The actions threaten to affect the UAE’s and Saudi Arabia’s dreams of capitalising on cheap energy and plentiful land to become major players in AI infrastructure.
Tech companies and Gulf states had outlined plans for major data centre investments in recent years, as the region’s governments seek to move beyond oil and curry favour with the US, which is racing against China to develop powerful artificial intelligence systems.
Data centres are typically large and sensitive to disruption, making them vulnerable targets for attack.
Microsoft did not comment. IBM, Google, Amazon, Nvidia, Oracle and Palantir were contacted for comment.
