Cloudflare blocks billions of attacks on elections, media

Cloudflare has reported a surge in cyber threats against public interest groups, election bodies and media outlets, as it detailed the impact of its security and sustainability programmes in 2025, including nearly 10 billion cyber attacks blocked each month for vulnerable organisations and 200 million attacks stopped against election infrastructure.

The company released its fifth annual Impact Report outlining work across internet security, election protection, AI-related risks for journalism, digital inclusion and emissions reduction. Cloudflare said it provided more than USD $19 million in donated products and services during 2025 through these programmes.

The initiatives sit within Cloudflare’s stated mission around internet security and accessibility. The firm highlighted support for journalists, human rights organisations, election agencies and non-profits facing targeted digital attacks and rapid advances in artificial intelligence.

“Our mission - to help build a better Internet - is the driving force behind everything we do,” said Matthew Prince, co-founder and CEO, Cloudflare. “In 2025, we took critical steps to further that mission by making our products free and accessible to those who need them most, from journalists facing attacks to startups and developers around the world working on the next generation of AI-native applications. A principled, accessible, and sustainable Internet is not just a goal; it's our responsibility.”

Cloudflare said it protected elections across 33 US states and seven countries under its Athenian Project. The project covers the public-facing websites and systems of state and local election authorities.

The company said the Athenian Project now protects 441 state and local government internet properties. Between September and November 2024 the systems blocked 200 million distributed denial of service attacks directed at those election-related sites.

Cloudflare also said it supported the Mouldovan parliamentary elections. It reported persistent cyber attacks against Mouldovan government institutions and referred to a significant foreign influence campaign, alongside technical attempts to disrupt services.

The report describes a steep increase in attacks on civil society and media. Cloudflare’s Project Galileo initiative covered more than 3,000 vulnerable internet properties in 2025, including journalists, human rights defenders and humanitarian organisations in over 120 countries.

Those sites experienced an average of 9.9 billion cyber attacks per month according to Cloudflare’s data. The company said it blocked a record volume of traffic aimed at independent news organisations, averaging 290 million attacks per day during the year.

Cloudflare said these attacks often attempt to silence or disrupt groups that work in the public interest. It framed the Galileo programme as a permanent security layer for organisations that cannot easily fund advanced cyber protection.

The company has also begun addressing risks from artificial intelligence tools scraping online content. It highlighted a rise in concerns from local and independent news outlets about the use of their articles and data in AI training and services.

Cloudflare said it has added Bot Management and a feature called AI Crawl Control into its free service package for organisations in Project Galileo. Bot Management targets automated traffic that hits websites. AI Crawl Control lets site owners define which AI crawlers can access their content.

Cloudflare said it will train news outlets on the new AI-related tools. It said this support is intended for journalists and non-profits that want more influence over how AI services access and use their original work in an AI-focused digital market.

The company also reported progress against its environmental targets. It said it has completed a commitment to offset or remove all emissions associated with powering its network from its launch up to its first renewable energy purchase in 2018.

Cloudflare said it invested in verified projects that totalled about 31,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent. The offsets relate to electricity used for its network infrastructure in that period.

The firm positioned this as part of a broader programme on energy use and emissions in internet infrastructure. It said the work forms one strand of its efforts around a more sustainable internet.

Cloudflare also outlined plans for workforce development with an emphasis on artificial intelligence. The company said it intends to hire 1,111 interns over the course of 2026.

The initiative will focus on a wide range of disciplines. Cloudflare said it aims to promote creative and widespread application of AI among the next generation of technology workers.

The company said it expects demand for AI-related skills to grow across sectors. It said its internship intake would reflect the role of AI in software development, security, data analysis and new internet services in the coming years.