Internet infrastructure company Cloudflare is among the 600 largest corporate stocks and is one of the largest web-related companies in existence. The firm is highly involved in blockchain.
Ethereum and IPFS gateways: Cloudflare operates an Ethereum gateway, allowing users to interact with the blockchain and its smart contracts more easily. This is closely related to Cloudflare's support for IPFS, a crypto-adjacent web hosting technology developed by Protocol Labs.
Hosting and other services: Cloudflare provides services to numerous cryptocurrency companies and centralized exchanges. Though its services are publicly available, it has published case studies on certain crypto websites that use its services, including the crypto exchange Bitfinex and the cloud mining service NiceHash.
Analysis: Cloudflare has analyzed various activities related to blockchain, such as DDOS attacks against cryptocurrency websites.
Retail services: Cloudflare's CEO mentioned the possibility of accepting Bitcoin as payment for its services as recently as 2015. However, that feature has not come to fruition as of March 2021.
Anti-crypto activity: Cloudflare has been criticized for taking down certain websites including Daily Stormer and 8chan. Though this did not affect the cryptocurrency community directly, some see the firm's centralized control over the web as a power that could extend to cryptocurrency.
Investments: Cloudflare has not invested in Bitcoin or related investment vehicles, nor has it invested in any blockchain firms.
Executive sentiment: Cloudflare CEO and founder Matthew Prince has acknowledged Bitcoin impartially. Most notably, he authored a 2015 article for HuffPost, citing Bitcoin as an early stage in the next "cryptography war."
Summary: Cloudflare is well aware of Bitcoin, Ethereum, and blockchain, and it will likely expand its involvement. Given Cloudflare's massive internet presence, its involvement in cryptocurrency is arguably overlooked.
