AI Crawlers Are Gutting the Web
AI crawlers hog 4.2% of web traffic yet send almost zero visitors back—see who freeloads most
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If you notice a website you frequently visit suddenly crashes one day, the culprit might not be hackers or excessive traffic—it could be a swarm of “invisible” AI crawlers secretly invading.
Cloudflare, a web security company, recently released its 2025 annual review report, presenting us with an alternative perspective on AI’s existence from the viewpoint of the underlying infrastructure.
Let me give a simple explanation for those unfamiliar: Cloudflare is essentially the internet world’s property management and security guard combined—managing security, acceleration, and traffic. They’re truly an all-around player.
For example, when you access a website using Cloudflare, and it loads instantly, it’s likely because they’ve directed you to the nearest data center. When websites can withstand DDoS attacks and aren’t afraid of crawler disruptions, Cloudflare is often behind them.
However, once Cloudflare goes down, half the internet suffers, which has spawned quite a few memes.
Enough talk—let’s focus on the AI trends hidden in this report.
