- Joined
- May 16, 2023
- Messages
- 36,342
- Points
- 113
Report: Bots Make up Nearly Half of Worldwide Internet Traffic
April 17, 2024
FILE - A view of the new supercomputer, the MareNostrum5, at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center, Spain, on Friday, Dec. 15, 2023. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)
See comments
Report: Bots Make up Nearly Half of Worldwide Internet Traffic
A report by a cybersecurity company suggests that nearly half of the world’s internet traffic is now produced by computer systems called bots.
A bot is a software program that often works by itself on the internet to perform the same kinds of actions as humans do.
The report, produced by California-based internet security company Imperva, found that 49.6 percent of worldwide internet traffic came from bots in 2023. That is the highest level reported since the company started examining bot traffic levels in 2013. Traffic from human users fell to 50.4 percent.
Imperva’s study also found that web traffic linked to “bad bots" grew to 32 percent in 2023, a rise of 30.2 percent from 2022.
Nanhi Singh heads application security at Imperva. She said in a statement that bots are currently “one of the most pervasive and growing threats facing every industry.”
Bots are generally designed to visit websites and independently search for many kinds of online information. They are able to operate at much greater speeds than humans and can process repeated searches and process large amounts of data.
Online search advisor Yoast notes that some bots are considered good because they are built to carry out legal, productive activities for businesses.