Last year, bots accounted for over 40 percent of internet traffic, a significant increase compared to 2020.
Enlarge
Bots account for an ever-increasing share of global internet traffic.
© wikimedia.org
Not all internet requests are caused by humans. Numerous programs and scripts also cause an increase in Internet traffic. The latest bot report from the company Imperva shows that their share of Internet traffic in 2021 was over 42 percent. So-called “bad bots” were responsible for a record 27.7 percent of all global website hits last year. In the previous year, this value was still 25.6 percent. Most commonly, these dangerous scripts were used for web account theft, price gouging, or scalping.
Advanced protection urgently needed
This increase is a cause for concern, especially for companies. According to Ryan Windham, vice president at Imperva, automated fraud could increase even more in the years to come. An advanced protection function against bots is therefore essential to avert the increasing threat to companies and their customers.
Germany at the top
In addition, last year 64.1 percent of unauthorized account takeovers were committed by “advanced bad bots”. The financial industry was the focus of criminals the most with 34.6 percent of all attacks, followed by the travel industry with 23.2 percent. However, large regional differences can be observed: while Germany has one of the highest values for “bad bots” at 39.6 percent, the global average was significantly lower at 27.7 percent. All of the statistics for the past year are available for viewing on the Imperva website.
This is how you effectively protect yourself against botnets
