VK Ads auction prices rise 20% after attacks on Yandex data centers
After the attacks on Yandex's data centers, some advertisers halted their campaigns in Direct, and the VK Ads auction rose by 15–20% in the cheapest audience categories.
The cost of the VK Ads auction has risen by 15–20% over several days following the attacks on Yandex's data centers. This was reported by two sources in the advertising market: the increase affected broad audience categories that are usually considered the cheapest.
What is happening with Direct?
Due to outages in Yandex's ad cabinets, some advertisers have started abandoning promotion through Direct and switching to alternative channels. Among those who pulled out are the Fifth Channel, the provider Dom.ru, and the developer Dogma. The press services of these companies did not respond to requests for comment, and VK Ads declined to comment.
The outages began after attacks on Yandex's data centers (data processing centers) and affected the operation of its advertising services. According to sources, some Yandex Cloud clients managed to reduce the number of active campaigns in Direct, while others had their campaigns stopped, with funds for promotion continuing to be deducted.
Simply put: the ads either don't work or work only partially, while the money keeps being spent — and clients have started looking for backup platforms.
Who will pay for the outages?
Another market participant warns: part of Yandex's costs and losses will now fall on advertising agencies. The mechanism is cutting super commissions (increased agency rewards for bringing in clients) from the flow of clients.
This means that the losses from the technical failure may be distributed not only to the platform itself but also to intermediaries — agencies working with Yandex under contracts.
What's next?
The flow of advertising budgets into VK Ads has already affected prices: a 15–20% auction increase in cheap segments points to heightened demand for the alternative tool. If the outages continue, pressure on rates will persist.
Key takeaway: an attack on one player's infrastructure changed the balance of power in the contextual and display advertising market within days — and the rising cost of alternative channels became the first measurable consequence.
Source: Коммерсантъ
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