According to recent research, bots accounted for nearly half of all internet traffic in 2022, according to the Independent. According to the 2023 Imperva Bad Bot Report, bots accounted for nearly half (47.4%) of all internet traffic in 2022, a 5.1% year-over-year rise. In the meantime, the percentage of human traffic fell to 52.6%, the lowest level in eight years. Notably, a bot is a piece of software that performs automated operations and is typically employed to boost engagement and follower numbers. Meanwhile, harmful software programmes known as “bad bots” are capable of high-speed abuse and misuse when running automated activities. Some can successfully imitate human behaviours to evade detection by security software.
This is a concerning trend for businesses as advanced bad bots use the latest evasion techniques
“Bad bots interact with applications like legitimate users would, making them harder to detect and block. They abuse business logic by exploiting the way a business operates, rather than exploiting technical vulnerabilities. They enable high-speed abuse, misuse, and attacks on websites, mobile apps, and APIs. They allow bot operators, attackers, unsavoury competitors, and fraudsters to perform a wide array of malicious activities,” the company said in its report. As of 2022, the number of ”bad bots,” as they are known, was at its greatest, according to the business, which began monitoring the trend in 2013. According to Imperva, bad bot traffic increased by 2.5% in 2022 and currently accounts for 30.2% of total traffic. The report also notes that problematic bot traffic has been steadily increasing over the past four years.
“This is a concerning trend for businesses as advanced bad bots use the latest evasion techniques and closely mimic human behaviour to evade detection by cycling through random IPs, entering through anonymous proxies, and changing identities”, the researchers said. They fear that bot activity is expected to increase even further this year with the arrival of OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Bard. “Cyber criminals will increase their focus on attacking API endpoints and application business logic with sophisticated automation. As a result, the business disruption and financial impact associated with bad bots will become even more significant in the coming years”, the researchers noted.
