The lava lamp usually gets a bum rap as some kind of lowbrow psychedelic entertainment system for people who are too strung out to enjoy any stimulation of real substance. But the lazy loafing sources of light and blobs (endless blobs!) are most definitely a lot more than a way to keep somebody distracted while they're coming down off a Kalaxian Crystal high. In fact, it turns out that a wall of lava lamps is a critical component of the encryption effort responsible for about 10% of internet traffic. It both inspires awe, and an urge to re-watch Half-Baked. YouTuber and maker of things Tom Scott looked into the wall of internet-protecting lava lamps when he recently visited Cloudflare, Inc. in San Francisco. You may not have heard of Cloudflare, but the tech company (which is partly owned by Google, of course) is responsible for the protection of over six million websites, including many large, recognizable names like Uber, OKCupid, and Fitbit. It's difficult to overstate the
