USDCrypto Platforms Reeling After AWS Outage Exposes Deep Reliance on Centralized Cloud Infrastructure
Coinbase, Robinhood, and Global Services Knocked Offline as AWS Failure Sparks Industrywide Disruption
TL;DR
- A major AWS outage on Oct. 20, 2025, took Coinbase, Robinhood, and several crypto networks offline for hours.
- The issue stemmed from DNS resolution errors in AWS’s US-EAST-1 region, triggering over 11 million user complaints.
- Experts call it a wake-up call on crypto’s heavy dependence on centralized cloud infrastructure despite its decentralization ethos.
Amazon Web Services suffered a sweeping failure on October 20 that rippled through the internet, disrupting trading on Coinbase, Robinhood, and a host of other platforms reliant on its infrastructure. The disruption began in AWS’s US-EAST-1 region—its Northern Virginia data hub—and quickly cascaded across global services. AWS traced the cause to DNS resolution issues affecting its DynamoDB database service, which prevented platforms from translating domain names into IP addresses, effectively cutting users off from the data that was still safely stored on servers.
Coinbase users were locked out of their accounts for several hours, unable to log in, place trades, or process withdrawals. Even the company’s Ethereum layer-2 network, Base, experienced connectivity failures. Coinbase later confirmed that “some users may now be able to access and use services,” while assuring that “all funds remain safe.” Robinhood traders faced similar problems, with the company’s APIs malfunctioning and trade execution slowing to a crawl during U.S. morning hours. User complaints surged into the millions as traders across platforms reported being unable to execute orders or even check balances.
AWS reported at 8:52 p.m. UTC that it continued to “make progress toward pre-event levels in all Availability Zones (AZs).” More than 11 million outage reports were logged worldwide, according to independent trackers, with some estimates citing 6.5 million user complaints across a dozen countries. The failure affected over 50 platforms globally, stretching far beyond crypto into sectors such as aviation, banking, gaming, and streaming. Delta, United Airlines, Lloyds Bank, and Fortnite were among those hit, underscoring the scale of the disruption caused by a single cloud provider’s malfunction.
The outage reignited debate about crypto’s dependence on centralized infrastructure. Despite its decentralized branding, much of the digital-asset ecosystem—including blockchains and exchanges—relies on centralized cloud providers like AWS for storage, data routing, and APIs. “The platform preaching decentralization just got taken out by one centralized cloud,” a Decrypt editor observed. XION founder Anthony Anzalone remarked that the incident revealed “how the internet relies on chokepoints that fail under pressure,” while cybersecurity expert Mike Chapple quipped, “When a major cloud provider sneezes, the internet catches a cold.”
Technical experts emphasized that the failure was not caused by a cyberattack but by internal system malfunction. AWS acknowledged that its DynamoDB and global tables in the US-EAST-1 region had been affected, and restricted new EC2 launches to stabilize recovery. Analysts compared the outage to the 2024 CrowdStrike debacle, describing it as another example of how interconnected digital supply chains create systemic vulnerabilities. Some legal experts noted that AWS service-level agreements offer minimal compensation for business losses, leaving companies like Coinbase and Robinhood to absorb the reputational fallout themselves.
Coinbase stated that it is reorganizing its infrastructure to prevent similar incidents, but the event has already become a case study in the fragility of modern finance’s digital backbone. While no funds were lost or compromised, the hours-long disruption undercut the “always-on” image crypto companies often promote. The episode also highlighted the paradox at the heart of the industry: assets that exist on decentralized ledgers are still only as accessible as the centralized systems that connect users to them.
This article has been refined and enhanced by ChatGPT.
