Intensifying bot wars, a sharp rise in attacks on civil society organizations, and rapid progress in post-quantum encryption mark a pivotal year online
DUBAI, UAE, 16th December, 2025 –
Cloudflare, Inc., the security, performance, and reliability company helping to build a better Internet, today published its sixth annual Year in Review, one of the most comprehensive views of how the Internet behaved in 2025. The report—accompanied by a spotlight on the most popular Internet services—highlights the most significant Internet trends, traffic patterns, and security insights from the past year.
The Internet plays a central role in both our personal and professional lives, and this year marked a notable shift in how much society depends on it—driven by significant growth and major technological changes. Global Internet traffic ballooned by 19% year-over-year, and substantial advances were introduced across artificial intelligence technologies.
At the same time, there were major milestones in security. Post-quantum encryption now secures 52% of all human Internet traffic, helping protect users from future threats. However, this growth also brought challenges, including a dramatic escalation in cyber warfare that led to more than 25 record-breaking distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks.
“The Internet isn’t just changing; it’s being fundamentally rewired. From AI to more creative and sophisticated threat actors, every day is different. While we celebrated several Internet milestones this year, we also blocked attacks that redefined what ‘scale’ means, and witnessed the traditional business model of online content creation face stark challenges,” said Matthew Prince, CEO and co-founder at Cloudflare.
“With a huge percentage of the Internet running through Cloudflare’s network every second of every day, we believe we have a unique responsibility to help navigate these changes and build a better Internet for everyone.”
Cloudflare’s Year in Review shares key data insights about the evolving Internet landscape to help keep the online world more informed, resilient, and secure. Top highlights of 2025 include:
• Google and Meta’s Reign Continues at the Top
Google and Facebook (now Meta) retained their positions as the two most popular Internet services globally for the fourth consecutive year, while ChatGPT held onto the number one spot in the rapidly growing Generative AI category.
• The AI Bot Wars Heat Up with a Single Dominant Player
Google’s crawling bot far outpaced all other leading AI bots, becoming the single largest source of automated Internet traffic.
• Cybercriminals Pivot to New Vulnerable Targets
For the first time, civil society and non-profit organizations became the most targeted sector, likely due to the sensitive nature and potential financial value of their data.
• Governments Lead as the Top Cause of Major Outages
Nearly half of all major Internet disruptions worldwide were triggered by government actions. Meanwhile, outages caused by cable cuts declined by nearly 50%, while those linked to power failures doubled.
• Europe Leads the World in Internet Speed and Quality
European countries dominated global connectivity rankings, achieving the highest average download speeds—each exceeding 200 Mbps—with Spain securing the top position worldwide for overall Internet quality.
This data comes from Cloudflare Radar, a free tool that allows anyone to explore global Internet trends and insights. Radar is powered by data from Cloudflare’s global network—one of the world’s largest, spanning more than 330 cities across 120+ countries—and aggregated, anonymized data from Cloudflare’s 1.1.1.1 public DNS Resolver, widely used for fast and private Internet browsing.
To learn more about Cloudflare’s 2025 Year in Review, please visit:
• Blog: Cloudflare 2025 Year in Review
• Blog: Most Popular Internet Services 2025
• 2025 Year in Review Microsite
