Parts of the internet experienced a significant outage due to a technical problem at Cloudflare, a major internet infrastructure provider that powers many online services. This disruption impacted popular websites such as X (formerly Twitter) and ChatGPT causing them to display error messages and become inaccessible for users. The problem began around 11:30 am UK time and lasted for several hours, with Cloudflare issuing ongoing updates as it investigated and worked to restore services.
What is Cloudflare?
Cloudflare is a major global internet infrastructure and security company. It provides services that help websites load faster, remain online during heavy traffic, and protect against cyber attacks. Approximately 20% of all websites worldwide use Cloudflare in some form. These services include acting as a reverse proxy that checks whether visitors are humans or bots, protecting sites from Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, and optimizing the delivery of website content through a large network of distributed servers around the world.
How does Cloudflare work?
Cloudflare operates a vast network of data centers globally, which act as intermediaries between users and the original web servers. When you visit a website using Cloudflare, your connection is routed through the closest Cloudflare server, which caches the site content to reduce load times and alleviate traffic pressure on the original servers. This setup not only speeds up access but also filters out malicious traffic and prevents cyber attacks from overwhelming websites.
Why do outages at Cloudflare affect so many websites?
Because Cloudflare serves a huge portion of the internet, disruptions in its infrastructure can cause widespread outages across many sites simultaneously. This outage was described as a “catastrophic disruption” to Cloudflare’s network, highlighting its role as one of the internet’s largest single points of failure. Sites relying on Cloudflare’s protective and performance-enhancing tools can become inaccessible if Cloudflare experiences technical issues, as was evident in this recent incident that also impacted DownDetector, the site used to report online service issues.
What websites has the Cloudflare outage disrupted?
The recent Cloudflare outage impacted a wide range of major websites and online services across the internet. Some of the most prominent affected sites included:
- X (formerly Twitter)
- ChatGPT
- Letterboxd
- Bet365
- Zoom
- PayPal
- Other notable affected services included gaming platform League of Legends, payment company Sage, shopping platform Vinted, and the dating app Grindr.
This is a developing story.
