Plain-English explainers on the machinery behind the sites, apps and networks you use every day.
11 articles
A number saved where text belonged stopped every paid DNS server at once. Here is how the failure worked, what the fixes are and how to add a backup DNS server.
Cloudflare has started grading approved crawlers on whether they obey robots.txt and back off when told to. Here is what the new system measures and what it leaves unsaid.
The padlock in your browser now has a shorter shelf life, and the limit keeps shrinking until 2029. Here is how it works and why browsers pushed for it.
Cloudflare blocked 935 attacks above 1 Tbps in the first half of 2026. Here is how DDoS floods work, why most end fast and what you would notice.
Exam blackouts, cable cuts and drone strikes all show up as the same dip on a graph. Here is how a country goes offline and how outsiders can tell.
In May 2026, a routine key change at Germany's .de registry made millions of working websites look broken. Here is the machinery behind it.
One header, one character, and a growing pile of state law behind it. Here is what Global Privacy Control sends and why websites must listen.
The number on your screen is a claim, not a fact. Here is how scammers fake it, how digital call signatures fight back and where the gaps remain.
A convincing copy of your bank’s login page can fool you. It cannot fool the cryptography behind a passkey. Here is the small, strict rule that makes the difference.
Every so often, the world’s clocks add an extra second to stay in step with the planet. Computers hate it. Next week, the body that runs global timekeeping is set to discuss ending it.
You never told that shopping site where you live, yet it greets you with local prices. The answer is your IP address, a set of commercial maps of the internet and a farm in Kansas that learned how wrong those maps can be.