Russia hits Kyiv's datacentres and ISPs, knocking 100,000 homes offline, as a Starlink station burns in Poland. Winter war goes digital.

Briefing note: Russia has opened what The Guardian calls a new front against Ukraine, aimed at the digital backbone of its economy. Strikes on datacentres and internet providers Wednesday and Thursday caused temporary outages for about 100,000 households in and around Kyiv, according to Ukraine's digital transformation ministry. On Friday a drone hit the Kyiv offices of Datagroup, one of the country's largest telecom companies, killing four people. On Thursday, Polish authorities reported that a Starlink satellite station in central Poland serving Ukraine had been set on fire; local officials called it an "act of sabotage" linked to Moscow. Russia has hit datacentres before, the paper notes, but not on this scale. Add a shortage of Patriot missiles, new jet-powered Russian drones, and President Zelenskyy's statement that President Trump approved licences for Ukraine to build Patriots, which experts say could take years. Assessment: armies once bombed rail yards and power stations to break a country's will. This century the target list includes the servers that keep banks and payment systems running. When sabotage reaches a NATO member's soil, even as arson, the alliance must decide what it will call an attack. Winter will test the answer.