Cloudflare Outage Disrupts Websites Worldwide, Now Resolved
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A widespread disruption to internet services caused by a Cloudflare outage impacted numerous popular websites on Tuesday, November 18, before being fully resolved by 9:30 a.m. EST.
A “significant outage” at Cloudflare, the critical internet infrastructure platform powering sites like Spotify and OpenAI, sent ripples across the web, affecting access for users globally. The company acknowledged the disruption in a statement to USA TODAY, stating the issues began around 5:20 a.m.EST.
“Given the importance of Cloudflare’s services, any outage is unacceptable,” a company release stated. “We apologize to our customers and the Internet in general for letting you down today. We will learn from today’s incident and improve.”
What is cloudflare?
Cloudflare operates as a foundational layer of the internet, providing services that enhance website performance, security, and reliability. The platform is utilized by a vast array of popular websites, including League of Legends, Archive of Our Own, and many others.
Cause of the Outage
The root cause of the disruption stemmed from a configuration file used to manage threat traffic. According to the company, this file “grew beyond an expected size of entries and triggered a crash in the software system that handles traffic for a number of Cloudflare’s services.” Importantly, a company statement confirmed, “there is no evidence that this was the result of an attack or caused by malicious activity.”
Impact and Affected Websites
During the peak of the outage, users attempting to access affected websites where often met with a message prompting them to “please unblock challenges.cloudflare.com to proceed.” As of 9:30 a.m. EST, Cloudflare confirmed the outage was resolved, with services expected to return to normal over the following hours.
Data from Downdetector indicated a surge in reported outages for the following websites as of 9:00 a.m. EST:
- Archive of Our Own
- Canva
- Canvas
- Character AI
- ChatGPT
- Claude AI
- Dayforce
- Google Store
- Grindr
- ikea
- Indeed
- League of Legends
- Letterboxd
- OpenAI
- Quizlet
- Rover
- Spotify
- Square
- Truth Social
- UberX, formerly Twitter
- Zoom
The incident underscores the critical role that infrastructure providers like Cloudflare play in maintaining the accessibility of the modern internet. While the outage was relatively short-lived, it served as a stark reminder of the potential for widespread disruption when these foundational systems encounter issues.
Melina Khan of USA TODAY and Iris Seaton of the Asheville Citizen Times contributed to this report.
