How does Cloudflare’s DDoS protection work at the edge?

Cloudflare's DDoS protection operates at the edge of the network, closer to the users. When a request arrives, Cloudflare's edge servers analyze it and apply security measures before forwarding it to your origin server. This prevents the attack traffic from reaching your server infrastructure. They utilize a global network of servers to distribute the attack load, ensuring that your origin server remains available even under heavy attack.