Cloudflare Down: A major technical fault at internet infrastructure giant Cloudflare has caused widespread disruption, briefly taking numerous popular platforms, including X (formerly Twitter) and ChatGPT, offline for users across the United States and globally.
The widespread service degradation serves as a fresh reminder of the internet’s heavy dependence on a few core providers.
The disruption began earlier this afternoon, rapidly affecting a broad range of unrelated websites that rely on Cloudflare’s crucial services.
Users attempting to access platforms like the social media giant X, AI service ChatGPT, and film review site Letterboxd were met with error messages, often indicating an “internal server error on Cloudflare’s network,” and were asked to “please try again in a few minutes.”
Cloudflare, a vital component of the modern web, powers content delivery, security protections that shield sites from cyberattacks, and essential tools that help websites remain accessible during high-traffic surges.
When its systems fail, the impact ripples across the internet, echoing the scale of a previous AWS outage.
The company confirmed the issue in an initial update, stating, “Cloudflare is aware of, and investigating an issue which potentially impacts multiple customers,” with the promise of more details as they become available.
The problems were dramatic enough to even affect the outage tracking website, Down Detector, which struggled to load because it also relies on Cloudflare. Once operational, Down Detector displayed a massive spike in problems reported across platforms including X and Spotify. This major technical fault highlights the vulnerability of the modern internet’s centralized infrastructure.
