A massive internet outage stemming from errors in Amazon cloud services on Monday morning demonstrated just how many people rely on the corporate behemoth's computational infrastructure everyday — and laid bare the vulnerabilities of an increasingly concentrated system.

But despite its omnipresence, most users don't know what — or where — the cloud is.

Here is what to know about the data centers in Northern Virginia where the outage originated, and what the malfunction reveals about a rapidly evolving industry.

Cloud computing is a technology that allows companies to remotely access massive computing equipment and services without having to purchase and maintain physical infrastructure.

In other words, businesses ranging from Snapchat to McDonald's essentially rent Amazon's physical

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