Russia Enacts Law Allowing Central Bank and Financial Institutions to Shoot Down Drones

Russia has enacted a law allowing the central bank and other financial institutions to counter unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) or drone attacks using their own defence systems, as the country struggles to defend itself from Ukrainian assaults.

According to CNBC International, the law was passed by Russia’s parliament on Tuesday, 26 May 2026. The legislation empowers central bank staff to be armed and operate systems designed to down UAVs or drones without involving special forces.

Ukrainian military increasingly employs long-range drone strikes, prompting Russia to expand its capabilities to defend its vast airspace. Russia’s largest bank, Sberbank, the Russian Cash Collection Association, and the Special Postal Service, which handles confidential and top-secret government correspondence, are among the institutions permitted to oversee their own drone defence operations.

Employees will be ‘empowered to prevent the operation of unmanned aerial vehicles, surface and underwater vessels, unmanned ground vehicles, and other autonomous unmanned systems,’ according to a report dated Wednesday, 25 May 2026.

The authority can be used to counter attacks on protected facilities or threats to staff and others on-site, the report states. Attacks can be thwarted by jamming or altering drone control signals, disrupting control panels, or damaging or destroying the drones.

Both Russia and Ukraine deny intentionally targeting civilian infrastructure as part of the ongoing conflict, which began in February 2022. However, several attacks on critical infrastructure and facilities in both countries have occurred, alongside cyber warfare.

Anatoly Aksakov, chair of the State Duma’s Financial Markets Committee, told RBC Radio that anti-drone systems will be placed near key facilities and staff will be armed.

‘First, jamming will be used to make it difficult [for UAVs] to target and attack relevant sites,… Additionally, we will use methods to shoot down these drones to protect the targets,’ he added, noting that institutions will fund their own anti-drone systems.

‘If it’s the central bank, the central bank pays; if it’s Sberbank, Sberbank pays,’ Aksakov said, as quoted by CNBC International on Wednesday, 27 May 2026.

With the US focused on its own military operations against Iran, efforts to bring Moscow and Kyiv to peace talks appear to have stalled as the conflict escalates.