When a website is protected by Cloudflare, not every incoming request is treated the same way. Some requests pass through normally, while others may be blocked, challenged or flagged by security rules.<\/p>\n
But what happens when you want to understand why a request was blocked?<\/p>\n
Perhaps a customer reports that a contact form is no longer working. Your payment integration starts failing. A member cannot access an account, or your website begins receiving an unusual volume of suspicious requests.<\/p>\n
Simply knowing that Cloudflare is active does not tell you what happened. You need to examine the available security information and identify the rule or service responsible.<\/p>\n
Cloudflare Pro provides access to security analytics features that help website owners investigate security events and understand how configured protections are handling traffic. Knowing how to interpret this information can help you improve security without unnecessarily disrupting legitimate visitors.<\/p>\n
Cloudflare Security Events provide visibility into requests that Cloudflare security products have acted on or flagged.<\/p>\n
Depending on the configuration, these events may relate to web application firewall rules, browser integrity checks, rate limiting or other security controls.<\/p>\n
For example, a request might trigger a managed firewall rule because its contents resemble a recognised attack pattern. Another request might match a custom rule created by the website administrator.<\/p>\n
The event information helps you investigate what happened, which security feature was involved and what action was taken.<\/p>\n
An important distinction is that Security Events are not a complete record of every request reaching your website. If you want to analyse traffic that was not acted on by a security feature, Cloudflare’s Security Analytics provides a broader view of incoming HTTP requests.<\/p>\n
Understanding the difference prevents you from assuming that the events dashboard represents all website activity.<\/p>\n
To investigate events for a website, sign in to the Cloudflare dashboard and select the relevant domain.<\/p>\n
Navigate to the domain’s Analytics area and open the Events view. The precise menu labels may vary as Cloudflare updates its dashboard.<\/p>\n
From there, you can examine event summaries, filter the displayed information and inspect available event details.<\/p>\n
Cloudflare’s documentation explains that paid plans, including Pro, provide additional dashboard functionality compared with the limited sampled event view available on the Free plan. The available data and retention limits should always be checked against the current plan documentation.<\/p>\n
Start with a relevant time range. If a customer reports a problem that began an hour ago, examining the period around that incident is generally more useful than immediately reviewing a much larger window.<\/p>\n
A blocked request means that a security control prevented the request from proceeding normally through the relevant path. It does not automatically prove that someone was attacking your website.<\/p>\n
A request may be blocked because it matched a genuine attack pattern. It may also have been caught by an overly broad custom rule or another security setting.<\/p>\n
When reviewing an event, investigate several details together:<\/p>\n
The action taken.<\/strong> Determine whether the request was blocked, challenged or handled in another way. Different actions have different implications for the visitor.<\/p>\n The rule or security service.<\/strong> Identify which feature generated the event. This helps narrow down the setting that may need attention.<\/p>\n The requested path.<\/strong> A request targeting an unfamiliar administrative endpoint may deserve a different investigation from one involving a public contact form or a normal checkout page.<\/p>\n The source information.<\/strong> Review the available IP address, user-agent information, country and other relevant fields. None of these details alone establishes malicious intent.<\/p>\n The timing and pattern.<\/strong> A single request may be ordinary background noise. Repeated requests targeting the same endpoint or matching a consistent attack pattern may warrant closer investigation.<\/p>\n The objective is to establish context before changing any security controls.<\/p>\n A false positive occurs when a legitimate request is incorrectly identified as something that should be blocked or challenged.<\/p>\n For a business website, false positives can have real consequences. A customer may be unable to submit an enquiry, a payment processor may fail to complete a request, or a legitimate integration may stop communicating with the application.<\/p>\n Suppose a website owner reports that a form stopped working after a security rule was introduced. The administrator can review the relevant time period, filter events for the affected URL and determine whether the new rule is involved.<\/p>\n If the event shows that the rule blocked the request, the next step is to inspect the rule’s conditions and the request details.<\/p>\n The administrator should then establish whether the request was legitimate before making an exception.<\/p>\n Avoid allowing traffic through simply because it originates from a familiar country or appears to come from a known user-agent. Those characteristics can be misleading. Where appropriate, verify the source, inspect application logs and test the affected workflow.<\/p>\n A sudden rise in security events may indicate increased malicious activity, but it can also follow a configuration change or a surge in legitimate website traffic.<\/p>\n Begin by examining which security services are generating the events. Determine whether the increase is associated with one rule, one URL path, a particular traffic source or several different parts of the website.<\/p>\n Next, compare the timing with recent changes. Did someone modify a firewall rule? Was a new application feature launched? Did a marketing campaign generate additional visitors?<\/p>\n If the activity appears malicious, review the affected endpoints and identify whether the existing controls are taking appropriate action.<\/p>\n If the increase began after a configuration change, investigate whether that change is producing unexpected matches.<\/p>\n Do not assume that the highest event count automatically represents the greatest threat. A useful investigation considers the nature of the requests, the actions taken and the business impact.<\/p>\n Once you have identified a rule that is interfering with legitimate traffic, determine whether its conditions are too broad or whether a more targeted configuration would solve the problem.<\/p>\n For example, a custom rule might affect an entire website when the actual requirement concerns only a specific endpoint. Narrowing the rule’s scope may reduce unnecessary interference.<\/p>\n Where supported, an appropriate exception can be preferable to disabling an entire security feature.<\/p>\n After making a change, test the affected function and monitor subsequent events. Confirm that legitimate traffic works as intended and that the change has not introduced an unnecessary security gap.<\/p>\n If you cannot establish why a request was blocked, avoid making broad exceptions based on guesswork. Review the available evidence and seek technical assistance where necessary.<\/p>\n These two views answer different questions.<\/p>\n Security Events helps you investigate requests that security products acted on or flagged. It is particularly useful when you need to understand why something was blocked or challenged.<\/p>\n Security Analytics provides a broader picture of incoming HTTP traffic, including requests that were not acted on by Cloudflare security products.<\/p>\n For example, if you want to investigate why a particular customer request was blocked, start with Security Events. If you want to understand overall traffic patterns and identify unusual activity across the site, Security Analytics may be the better starting point.<\/p>\n Using the appropriate view makes investigations more efficient and reduces the risk of drawing conclusions from incomplete information.<\/p>\n No. Cloudflare Pro provides security capabilities and visibility into relevant activity, but website owners still need to understand their applications and configure the available controls appropriately.<\/p>\n Security events can help reveal blocked requests and potential false positives, but they do not replace application logs, secure development practices, software updates or incident response procedures.<\/p>\n A website can receive suspicious requests even when Cloudflare is working as intended. Equally, a website can have vulnerabilities that are not resolved simply by reviewing blocked traffic.<\/p>\n Security analytics should therefore be treated as one part of a wider approach to protecting the website and its hosting environment.<\/p>\n For businesses exploring additional website security capabilities, Tremhost offers a Cloudflare Pro-based security option from $9 per month<\/strong>.<\/p>\n You can review the current service details on the Tremhost Cloudflare page<\/a>.<\/p>\n Before selecting a provider, confirm what is included in the service, how security configuration is handled and what technical assistance is available. Websites with complex integrations, customer portals or e-commerce workflows may need more specialised configuration than a simple informational website.<\/p>\nHow to Identify False Positives<\/h2>\n
How to Investigate a Sudden Increase in Security Events<\/h2>\n
How to Adjust Security Rules Without Weakening Protection<\/h2>\n
Security Events Versus Security Analytics<\/h2>\n
Does Cloudflare Pro Automatically Manage Every Security Problem?<\/h2>\n
Cloudflare Pro Through Tremhost<\/h2>\n