AI agents are a ‘bane’ for some website operators, says Cloudflare
Cloudflare chief executive Matthew Prince has warned that artificial intelligence agents are becoming a major problem for some website operators.
By The Register
Cloudflare chief executive Matthew Prince has warned that artificial intelligence agents are becoming a major problem for some website operators.
Speaking during a company call, Prince said some Cloudflare customers viewed AI agents as “a bane to their business” and wanted to prevent them from accessing their websites.
He said automated agents could impose costs on businesses without providing a clear return. As an example, Prince referred to restaurants, suggesting that many could receive automated traffic without gaining any direct benefit from it.
Cloudflare has previously predicted that traffic generated by AI agents could eventually be 1,000 times greater than visits made through human clicks. Prince said the scale of that activity could make the problem significantly different from the low-value traffic produced by traditional web searches.
The Cloudflare CEO also said the company was reviewing its records for signs that hackers, criminal groups or nation-state actors had previously exploited the PHP2SHELL vulnerability.
Prince said such attackers had probably used the vulnerability before it was publicly disclosed, adding that Cloudflare expected to find evidence of earlier activity in its logs.
He also questioned the future of container-based computing, including systems used by hyperscale cloud providers and companies operating newer cloud infrastructure.
Prince acknowledged that containers were a major improvement over bare metal servers and virtual machines, and had helped support the growth of cloud and mobile applications. However, he argued that container-based architectures could struggle to handle the cost of the expected increase in AI-agent traffic.
Cloudflare is promoting its serverless Workers platform as one alternative to traditional container-based systems. The company also offers services designed to block AI agents, reduce the cost and traffic they generate, or help organisations earn revenue from AI-related visits.