On Tuesday 18 November at around 11:30am, around 20% of the entire internet went offline for the UK. This was due to a problem with Cloudfare – one of the largest hosting sites on the planet. The outage then rapidly spread across the world.
Internet down thanks to Cloudfare
Cloudflare’s exact number of hosted websites is hard to pinpoint, but it’s estimated to serve a vast number, with some sources indicating it is used by over 26 million sites, while others suggest it is utilized by nearly one-third of the top websites on the internet.
Additionally, a large number of sites have historically used Cloudflare, or are currently using its hosting service, which is a specific product.
So, if Cloudfare has issues then so does around 20% of the entire internet. This is exactly what has just happened. The Canary’s own site has been hit – because we run on WordPress, which runs on Cloudflare. X was down, as were countless other websites.
According to users on X, it was ‘server issues wot did it’:
cloudfare experiences networking issues pic.twitter.com/Fl4x1tf5SM
— sankalp (@dejavucoder) November 18, 2025
Meanwhile, people were wondering if this was just the beginning:
The start of something? pic.twitter.com/tq37zwpD9Y
—
RűstÿŎrb
As of 12pm on 18 November, it was unclear what the cause of the internet being down was. Just weeks before, another outage via Amazon hit numerous sites as well – and just days ago, Russia experienced a severe outage.
This started as a UK-based problem. This is because if you used a VPN and set it to a country outside the UK, everything comes back online. However, by 12pm it seemed to have spread across the planet – with only a few countries like Brazil currently online.
Lessons learned
A VPN, or virtual private network, creates a secure and encrypted connection over the internet to protect your data and mask your online activity. It works by routing your device’s internet traffic through a remote server, which masks your real IP address and location, making it appear as though you are browsing from the server’s location. This enhances privacy by preventing others, like your internet service provider (ISP) or people on public Wi-Fi, from seeing what you do online.
So, two lessons are to be learned from this. One: the concentration of power with just one company on the internet is bad news. And two: always use a VPN – not just for your own protection, but to make sure you’re online when the internet is down – hopefully.
Featured image via the Canary
By Steve Topple
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