Whenever I attempt to seek clarification as to whether a media server can be proxied I seem to find older articles where someone refers to TOS 2.8 or does not have a reference. Since TOS 2.8 no longer exists, I was hoping someone could point out a reference in TOS where a limitation like this is imposed. I tried to skim through it but didn’t see any immediate red flags. My current server is configured to dns only, which I understand isn’t an issue, but if it isn’t against TOS I would like to enable proxy.
2.8 TOS was moved to the cache section. You can enable proxy, but you will probably want to create a cache rule to bypass media content
See
Finally, we made it clear that customers can serve video and other large files using the CDN so long as that content is hosted by a Cloudflare service like Stream, Images, or R2. This will allow customers to confidently innovate on our Developer Platform while leveraging the speed, security, and reliability of our CDN. Video and large files hosted outside of Cloudflare will still be restricted on our CDN, …
Thank you for the resource and clearing that up! I’ve enabled proxy on my subdomain and created a page rule to bypass caching for it.
2.8 was never about caching, and the move to its own ToS section doesn’t change that. Bypassing cache doesn’t stop that content from traversing Cloudflare’s Content Delivery Network and incurring bandwidth costs.
Was going based off of that. So, is the rule required?
I guess it’s a matter of opinion. The section it’s been moved to is CDN, so it’s not exclusively “Cache.” The only time “Cache” is used in the ToS is to describe that CDNs are for caching and serving content. And then goes on to describe the issue as “serving,” and not “caching.”
Unless you have an extremely high volume of data going through, it’s unlikely to get noticed. You’re also not going to get banned for life. If it gets their attention, they’ll just not deliver that content, and then lift the restriction after you stop proxying the offending content.
So going off of…
https://www.cloudflare.com/service-specific-terms-application-services/
Cloudflare offers specific Paid Services (e.g., the Developer Platform, Images, and Stream) that you must use in order to serve video and other large files via the CDN. Cloudflare reserves the right to disable or limit your access to or use of the CDN, or to limit your End Users’ access to certain of your resources through the CDN, if you use or are suspected of using the CDN without such Paid Services to serve video or a disproportionate percentage of pictures, audio files, or other large files.
It is my understanding that it is against their terms still to serve specifically media content through their CDN (in this case, via proxy) without using their specific paid services (in this case stream).
Would this be the correct answer?
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Yes, that is correct. You are allowed to serve video stored in e.g. Cloudflare R2 or using Cloudflare Stream. If you want to serve video or other large files from your origin server, you must be on the Enterprise plan.
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What would define a ‘large’ file? I don’t see it defined in the page. Asking for the sake of file servers. The definition of large has varied greatly in previous years, so a guide or even a flexible definition would be nice to go off of.
If loading it on a web page would annoy visitors, it’s probably large. There are some numbers listed in the Cache documentation that may or may not be relevant.
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Thanks for the resource! I believe that clears that up as well.
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