Massive Internet Outage Reported As Cloudflare Suffers Technical Failure
A major internet disruption hit large parts of the web on Tuesday after Cloudflare, one of the world’s most critical internet infrastructure companies, suffered a widespread technical failure, knocking off major websites including X (formerly Twitter), ChatGPT, Letterboxd and others.
According to The Independent UK, users across the world suddenly found themselves unable to access multiple platforms, instead receiving error pages that linked the failure to Cloudflare’s network.
Cloudflare, whose services form the hidden backbone of the modern internet by shielding websites from cyberattacks and managing heavy traffic, confirmed it was dealing with a serious incident.
“Cloudflare is aware of, and investigating an issue which potentially impacts multiple customers,” the company said in a new update.
“Further detail will be provided as more information becomes available.”
Even Down Detector, a global outage-tracking tool, was itself knocked offline at intervals. When it did load, it showed a dramatic spike in outage reports, underscoring how widespread the failure had become.
Users affected by the incident were met with a notification warning of an “internal server error on Cloudflare’s network” and were told to “please try again in a few minutes.”
Independent UK reports that according to Down Detector’s data, the outage quickly spread, pulling more services into the chaos. Platforms ranging from the shopping marketplace Vinted to the gay dating platform Grindr were suddenly showing signs of disruption.
However, the report adds an important caveat: Down Detector’s own instability means its outage tracking “might not be as dependable as usual.”
The company’s latest communication indicated that engineers are still fighting to restore normalcy.
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“We are continuing working on restoring service for application services customers,” Cloudflare announced — the update that will ultimately determine when major affected platforms return fully online.
Cloudflare’s status page shows that some recovery is underway: its Access and WARP tools have reportedly been fixed. But both are highly technical backend services, meaning the broader outage affecting mainstream websites could persist for longer.
The company stressed that it is “continuing to work towards restoring other services” as the global disruption ripples through the internet ecosystem.
