On Thursday June 12 2025 both Google Cloud and Spotify experienced widespread service disruptions impacting tens of thousands of users globally. According to Downdetector a real-time outage monitoring service the incidents affected connectivity performance and access across multiple regions .
Downdetector Reports Surge in Complaints
At approximately 226 p.m. ET user-submitted reports flooded Downdetector .
- Google Cloud Over 13000 user issues logged
- Spotify More than 27000 problem reports
These figures as reported by CBS News Reuters and the New York Post are likely underestimations since they only reflect self-reported user experiences .
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What Users Experienced
Google Cloud
As per BleepingComputer users reported disruptions in services including
- Cloud hosting
- Data access
- Authenticated APIs and services
- Regional connection failures
Spotify
Streaming giant Spotify faced widespread
- Streaming and app crashes
- Login failures
- Server disconnects
- Playback limited to cached content
Sources such as The Verge Newsweek and The Star Malaysia confirmed the cascading impact on mobile and desktop apps .
Cloudflare — A Likely Trigger
According to The Scottish Sun Republic World and MySanAntonio the root cause appears to involve Cloudflare a key internet infrastructure provider. At 119 p.m. CT Cloudflare issued alerts regarding .
- Authentication errors
- Network connectivity failures
- Widespread latency and service loss
The affected Cloudflare services included Access WARP Workers Dashboard and AI Gateway as reported by Forbes Newsweek and BleepingComputer .
Although Google Cloud doesn’t depend on Cloudflare for core cloud infrastructure it does use Cloudflare’s tools for performance and security optimization across some public-facing services .
Timeline & Company Responses
- 119 p.m. CT 219 p.m. ET – Cloudflare begins acknowledging the outages .
- 209 p.m. CST – Google Cloud confirms service disruption and notes partial recovery in certain regions. No full ETA provided
Source DigitalTrends Livemint - Spotify did not issue an official statement by early evening
Sources AOL Reuters - By mid-afternoon none of the affected companies had provided a definitive root cause explanation .
A Broader Internet Disruption
The outages were not limited to Google and Spotify. According to The Verge DigitalTrends JPost and MySanAntonio several other major platforms also experienced disruptions .
- Amazon Web Services AWS
- Discord
- Snapchat
- Twitch
- YouTube
- OpenAI
- CharacterAI
The simultaneous spike in service issues points toward a coordinated infrastructure fault possibly linked to Cloudflare’s authentication backbone .
Implications for Users & IT Teams
The incident underscores a critical point in modern cloud architecture .
- Even tech giants are vulnerable to infrastructure dependencies .
- Downdetector remains a vital tool for real-time issue detection but cannot reveal internal root causes .
- Failures at companies like Cloudflare can trigger cascading outages across the global internet .
What’s Next
- Cloudflare continues to investigate and has pledged ongoing updates via its official status page .
- Google Cloud is actively mitigating the impact although no full restoration timeline has been announced .
- Spotify along with AWS Discord and others is monitoring service restoration and awaiting infrastructure-level fixes .
Bottom Line
A major outage — apparently triggered by Cloudflare’s infrastructure issues — caused a ripple effect across some of the internet’s most-used platforms. With over 40000 user-reported incidents in a short span the June 12 event serves as a stark reminder of the internet’s hidden interdependencies .
While services are gradually recovering the full root cause and mitigation details remain pending from the affected companies .