CloneX and Animus NFT Images Disappear in Cloud Glitch

It All Came Down to a Cloudflare Glitch

This past Thursday, chaos hit the NFT world — especially for holders of the CloneX and Animus collections. Tens of thousands of NFT images vanished. According to Samuel Cardillo, Head of Tech at RTFKT, a bug occurred when Cloudflare downgraded their hosting plan early, cutting off the images tied to the NFTs.

“Nobody likes to see their content lost, especially when it’s 30,000+ NFT images,” – Phil Mataras, CEO of decentralized cloud network ar.io.

Problem Fixed — But It Exposed a Big Issue

Thankfully, the issue was fixed within hours. RTFKT worked with ar.io to restore the NFT images and migrate them to Arweave, a decentralised permanent storage solution.

This raised concerns again about centralisation in NFT storage. Even though NFTs exist on a blockchain, the images of NFTs often live on separate servers that can vanish or expire.

What This Means for NFT Creators and Collectors

Whether you're learning how to sell an NFT or exploring an NFT platform for artists, this was a wake-up call. Many NFTs use off-chain storage, which is fine, but only when it’s decentralised.

CryptoPunks showed the benefit of on-chain art, but larger, more detailed art needs systems like Arweave or IPFS.

“Once uploaded, these images will stay put, forever,” – Mataras

Takeaway for Artists and NFT Collectors

• Don’t just ask what an NFT is — ask where it’s stored.
• Check if your NFT image is stored on-chain or off-chain.
• Favour decentralised storage options for long-term safety.

In the fast-evolving world of art and NFTs, planning for permanence matters — especially if you're building your own NFT art collection or helping others with creating an NFT.