RTFKT NFTs Disappear After Cloudflare Glitch Disrupts Image Hosting

Images tied to the popular Ethereum NFT collections Clone X and Animus temporarily disappeared on April 24, leaving collectors with blank screens and a notice about a terms of service violation.

The glitch follows the closure of RTFKT, the digital studio behind the collections, which was shut down by Nike in December 2024. Whilst ownership and metadata remained secure on the blockchain, the visual assets linked to the tokens became temporarily inaccessible due to a third-party hosting problem.

RTFKT’s former Head of Technology, Samuel Cardillo, has since confirmed efforts are underway to prevent similar disruptions in the future.

Why did the NFTs disappear?

The images for RTFKT’s Clone X and Animus collections disappeared after Cloudflare downgraded the account responsible for serving the files. The downgrade, which Cardillo said happened a few days before the paid contract was due to expire, resulted in restrictions being applied to the content.

Instead of displaying NFT images, holders saw a generic black screen with a message indicating that the content had been restricted for violating Cloudflare’s terms of service. This occurred because the files were not stored directly on the Ethereum blockchain, but rather hosted off-chain and delivered through Cloudflare’s services.

Whilst the NFTs themselves were unaffected—the tokens, metadata, and ownership records remained on-chain—the incident highlighted the risks of relying on centralised hosting to display NFT content.

What’s next for RTFKT?

Although RTFKT as a company was closed by Nike in late 2024, its collections continue to exist and circulate in the secondary market. To safeguard the media assets associated with those collections, Cardillo announced a migration to Arweave, a decentralised storage network that allows users to store files permanently.

Using AR Drive, a tool built to interface with Arweave, the team plans to move approximately 200GB of image data by the end of April. This transition aims to eliminate reliance on services like Cloudflare and ensure that holders can continue to view their NFTs regardless of third-party service interruptions.

The storage move is estimated to cost around $2,800 and is intended to provide a more reliable solution for long-term access to the digital files linked to RTFKT’s NFTs.