NEW YORK, Nov 24:  Major internet outages are becoming more frequent and far-reaching, with experts warning that routine digital services are now increasingly vulnerable to disruptions caused by a handful of dominant cloud companies.

Tuesday’s hourslong crash at internet services provider Cloudflare — which disrupted platforms including X, OpenAI and Discord — marked the third large-scale outage in roughly a month, underscoring how dependent global systems have become on a small number of cloud giants.

Analysts say the pattern is clear: As more businesses rely on hyperscale cloud providers to run services cheaply and efficiently, even a small software bug or configuration error can reverberate across the web, making it appear as if “half the internet” has gone offline.

“This spate of outages has been uniquely terrible,” said Erie Meyer, former chief technology officer at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. “It’s like what we were told Y2K would be like, and it’s happening more often.”

The outages have also sparked a wave of online humor among developers familiar with the internet’s fragile plumbing — but the underlying concern is serious. Hyperscalers such as AWS, Microsoft Azure and Cloudflare have built vast infrastructures that dominate the global market, creating what critics describe as single points of failure.

“When one company’s bug can derail everyday life, that’s not just a technical issue — that’s consolidation,” Meyer said.

Since late October, three major incidents have triggered widespread service failures:

— Oct. 20: An Amazon Web Services outage cut access to platforms including Roblox, Fortnite and Ring cameras, and even disabled some smart beds.

— Oct. 29: A Microsoft Azure disruption brought down global services and hindered online check-ins at Alaska Airlines.

— Nov. 20: Cloudflare’s worst outage since 2019 halted traffic routing and affected millions of users.

Each incident stemmed from different technical problems — from DNS configuration errors at AWS and Microsoft to a bot-management software bug at Cloudflare, initially mistaken for a cyberattack. Last year’s CrowdStrike update glitch, which triggered worldwide “blue screen of death” failures, remains another stark example of the risks posed by concentrated digital infrastructure.

“These disruptions show how a minor glitch can escalate across enormous systems,” said Asad Ramzanali, director of AI and technology policy at Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator. He warned that dependence on a few cloud giants poses “both a market failure and a national security risk.”

Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince apologized publicly for the latest outage, acknowledging its impact across the internet. “We know we let you down today,” he said.

Industry experts stress that while cloud companies can improve resilience, resources are finite. “You don’t have infinite nerds,” said Akamai CTO James Kretchmar, adding that strategic investment in reliability remains key.

Some critics argue that outages should no longer be treated as minor inconveniences. J.B. Branch of Public Citizen urged greater regulation and oversight of the cloud sector.

“There needs to be investigations whenever these outages happen,” he said. “Whether we like it or not, the digital infrastructure of our economy is owned by a handful of companies — and that’s incredibly concerning.”