A power-related failure at Google's London cloud infrastructure on October 20 knocked out Revolut services for customers in Cyprus and other European countries, blocking card payments, transfers and cash withdrawals even though no funds were lost. The episode has sharpened scrutiny of how deeply retail banking now depends on a handful of external technology suppliers.
One supplier, many disrupted functions
Revolut said customer funds and data remained secure throughout the incident, but the outage still prevented people from using everyday banking functions. An inaccessible app does not mean an account has stopped working internally; it means the usual channel to reach that account has broken down. For individuals this can translate into rejected payments or delayed transfers, while businesses may struggle to complete transactions when point-of-sale or online payment systems go dark. Having alternative payment methods or an account with a different provider can offer some protection, though this varies by customer and is not a guaranteed fix.
Why geographic backups matter - and where they fall short
Modern banks run on a web of interconnected systems: their own data centers, cloud platforms, and services from outside vendors. A failure in just one link can cut off customer access without touching the bank's core systems. A Greek report examining the incident notes that the country's four systemic banks use Microsoft Azure for select functions, and highlights the value of geographically distributed backup sites, citing comments from Piraeus Bank's Group Chief Operating Officer, Haris Margaritis. Both Piraeus Bank and the National Bank of Greece reportedly spread infrastructure across multiple countries so that certain operations can shift between regions during a disruption - details specific to Greek institutions and not necessarily representative of arrangements used by banks in Cyprus.
Even well-designed geographic separation has limits. Backup data centers can still share electricity grids or telecommunications networks, and an outage affecting an entire cloud provider - rather than a single facility - forces banks to scramble to confirm whether alternate systems exist and can take over smoothly. Maintaining backup infrastructure is not sufficient on its own; banks must also regularly test recovery procedures to ensure services can actually continue during a real outage.
Regulators are already tightening oversight
Since January 17, 2025, the EU's Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA) has required financial institutions to manage technology risk, respond to incidents and test operational resilience, while also creating oversight of technology providers deemed critical to finance. The European Central Bank's supervisory priorities for 2026-2028 include a targeted review of how prepared selected banks are for disruptions involving major cloud providers, examining outsourcing risk and whether contingency plans can hold up under pressure. DORA does not mandate a single technical approach; each institution must tailor its continuity arrangements to its own risk profile.
A previous case illustrates the stakes: in July 2024, a faulty software update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike disrupted Windows systems worldwide, including at financial institutions, where customers faced problems with online banking, payments and ATMs. That incident involved no cloud outage or cyberattack, yet the European Banking Authority reported most affected banks restored operations the same day - underscoring how quickly a single external vendor's failure can ripple across the sector.
The digital euro is not a near-term fix
Discussions about reducing reliance on external payment providers have also touched on the ECB's proposed digital euro, envisioned as a public digital currency complementing cash and existing private payment methods, supporting both online and offline use. The project remains under development: a pilot is planned for the second half of 2027, with possible first issuance in 2029, contingent on EU legislation still being finalized. In Cyprus, the Central Bank of Cyprus announced in July 2026 that Bank of Cyprus and JCC Payment Systems had been chosen to join the planned pilot. Even if realized, the digital euro would add a payment option under European governance rather than automatically eliminate the risk of technology failures, since its own resilience would depend on the infrastructure built to support it.