Cloudflare outage Shock: 28% Traffic Down — 2nd Major Crash in 30 Days
Cloudflare outage Sparks Global Web Breakdowns
The Cloudflare outage on December 5, 2025 — popularly dubbed the “Cloudflare outage” — once again exposed the fragility of the modern internet’s backbone, as major services worldwide, including LinkedIn, Zoom and many others went offline for roughly half an hour. (theguardian.com)
What happened
At 08:47 UTC on December 5, part of Cloudflare’s network experienced a massive failure that cascaded across its web-traffic management systems. According to Cloudflare’s own postmortem, the glitch was triggered by changes to the “body parsing logic” in its Web Application Firewall (WAF), implemented to mitigate a recently disclosed vulnerability in React Server Components. (The Cloudflare Blog)
By 09:12 UTC, the company had restored services globally. Still, during that roughly 25-minute interval, around 28% of all HTTP traffic served by Cloudflare was disrupted. (The Cloudflare Blog)
Cloudflare was quick to clarify: this was not a cyberattack, but rather an unintended side-effect of an internal maintenance update — namely, modifications to parsing logic that inadvertently overloaded the system. (The Cloudflare Blog)
This marks the second major outage in less than 30 days for Cloudflare — a blow to a company that has long boasted about its reliability, speed, and security. (Wikipedia)
Services & Regions Impacted
The scope of the disruptions was broad, affecting not just video-conferencing or social-networking platforms, but also trading websites, e-commerce portals, gaming platforms, and tools used by millions globally. Among the affected: LinkedIn, Zoom, Canva, Shopify, Groww (Indian stockbroker), Fortnite, and even DownDetector — the very service people use to check outages. (Hindustan Times)
In India, platforms like Groww and other fintech/trading apps reported temporary unavailability. (Hindustan Times)
Additionally, third-party services relying on Cloudflare’s CDN and security infrastructure — from online games to e-commerce checkouts — also saw disruptions. (The Times of India)
Cloudflare’s Response
Cloudflare publicly apologized, acknowledging the outage and stating that “any outage of our systems is unacceptable.” (The Cloudflare Blog) They explained that the root cause was a change to their firewall body-parsing logic — specifically an internal update intended to protect clients from a known vulnerability in React Server Components. (The Cloudflare Blog)
The company assured that services were restored by 09:12 UTC, and that they are investigating how to prevent such incidents in the future. (The Cloudflare Blog)
Cloudflare also clarified that this was not due to a malicious attack. (The Cloudflare Blog)
Why It Matters — The Bigger Picture
- Centralization risk: The incident underscores how heavily the internet relies on a handful of infrastructure providers. When a major backbone like Cloudflare goes down, a vast swath of global traffic gets disrupted. As experts now warn, such concentration introduces a “single point of failure.” (theguardian.com)
- Trust erosion: Cloudflare has long been marketed as a paragon of reliability and performance. Two major outages within a month seriously damage that reputation — raising doubts about whether “big tech infrastructure” is really more resilient than smaller hosts. (Wikipedia)
- Global ripple effects: From professional networking (LinkedIn) to video calls (Zoom), online commerce, fintech, gaming, and even outage-tracking (DownDetector) — the outage showed that disruptions aren’t just technical glitches, but can have real-world economic, social, and business impacts. (The Times of India)
- Need for redundancy & decentralization: For businesses relying heavily on cloud/CDN providers, the outage serves as a wake-up call. Multi-cloud setups, distributed DNS, fallback plans may become more important than ever. (theguardian.com)
What Experts Are Saying
According to cyber-security analysts, the Cloudflare outage revealed fundamental weaknesses in the internet’s architecture. As highlighted by one observer: with so much of the web depending on a single provider, “when they fail, it immediately becomes a massive problem.” (theguardian.com)
One noted expert of digital infrastructure argued that while Cloudflare has delivered value — security protections, CDNs, reliable traffic routing — its growing dominance means that failures of this scale are now too consequential to be shrugged off as “glitches.” (theguardian.com)
Simultaneously, the frequency of outages — only weeks apart — is prompting companies to rethink dependencies and consider redundant or diversified cloud/CDN strategies. (Wikipedia)
What Should Users and Companies Do Now
- Monitor updates carefully: If you run a website or service through Cloudflare (or any major CDN), keep an eye on status pages and incident reports.
- Plan for redundancy: Use multi-CDN or multi-cloud setups, so that if one provider fails, traffic can be rerouted via another.
- Have a fallback plan: Websites and apps should design fallback or offline-mode behavior when dependencies go down — especially for critical services like e-commerce, communication, trading.
- Communicate transparently with customers: For businesses affected by outages, timely and honest updates — like what some trading platforms did — help maintain trust.
- Consider decentralization and smaller providers: Over-reliance on monopolistic infrastructure may be convenient, but it’s a risk. Diversifying providers can increase resilience.
FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)
Q1: What exactly caused the Cloudflare outage?
A: The outage was triggered by changes made to Cloudflare’s Web Application Firewall (WAF) body-parsing logic — part of an update meant to address a recent software vulnerability (in React Server Components). The change inadvertently overloaded internal systems, causing widespread HTTP 500 errors. (The Cloudflare Blog)
Q2: How long did the outage last, and how much traffic was affected?
A: The disruption started at 08:47 UTC and was resolved by 09:12 UTC — roughly 25 minutes. About 28% of all HTTP traffic handled by Cloudflare was affected. (The Cloudflare Blog)
Q3: Which services and websites were impacted?
A: Among the impacted were LinkedIn, Zoom, Canva, Shopify, Groww (and other fintech/trading platforms), Fortnite, DownDetector — and many more. Because Cloudflare underpins a large portion of the internet, the outage affected a broad set of services: social media, communication, e-commerce, trading, gaming, and more. (Hindustan Times)
Q4: Was this a cyberattack?
A: No — Cloudflare has confirmed that the outage was not caused by any external attack or malicious activity. It was an internal error triggered during routine maintenance. (The Cloudflare Blog)
Q5: Is this part of a recurring problem with Cloudflare?
A: Yes — this is the second significant outage for Cloudflare in under a month. The previous outage, on November 18, 2025, affected multiple major platforms including X (formerly Twitter), ChatGPT, Spotify, and various online games. (Wikipedia)
Q6: What does this mean for the future of internet infrastructure?
A: The incident calls into question the wisdom of centralizing critical parts of the internet under a few big providers. A growing number of experts now advocate for multi-cloud / multi-CDN strategies, better redundancy, and more decentralized internet architecture. (theguardian.com)
Why the Cloudflare outage matters
The December 5 Cloudflare outage is more than just a tech glitch. It’s a stark reminder that the foundations of the global internet — the systems we assume will just “work” — can be fragile. When just a single firewall update brings down 28% of HTTP traffic worldwide, it underscores how much of online life depends on a few key intermediaries.
For businesses, it’s a wake-up call to plan for redundancy, resilience, and transparency. For users, it’s a reminder that even the most trusted services can fail — and that the safety and stability of the internet can’t be taken for granted. For policy makers and infrastructure architects, it raises deeper questions: is the centralization of internet infrastructure worth the convenience, when a single misstep can affect billions?
As Cloudflare works to investigate root causes and promises improved safeguards, one thing is clear: the world will be watching — and depending on — the next move.
External References
- The Guardian — “Cloudflare apologises after latest outage takes down LinkedIn and Zoom” (theguardian.com)
- AP News — “Cloudflare says service restored after outage that brought down sites including Zoom and LinkedIn” (AP News)
- SiliconRepublic — “Fresh Cloudflare global outage hits LinkedIn, Zoom and more” (Silicon Republic)
- Forbes — “Cloudflare Says It Has Fixed Outage That Impacted Zoom, LinkedIn And Fortnite” (Forbes)
- Hindustan Times — “Cloudflare down again: Full list of websites impacted by global outage” (Hindustan Times)
Breaking-News Snippets
- Cloudflare outage knocks LinkedIn and Zoom
- 28% of internet traffic disrupted globally
- Second major Cloudflare crash in month
- Shopify, Canva, Groww also affected
- Infrastructure giant promises improved safeguards