The 2023 Bad Bot report from Imperva, which analyses bot traffic across the internet for the preceding year, recorded nearly half (47.4%) of all internet traffic came from bots, a 5.1% increase from the year before. In addition, human internet traffic decreased to its lowest level in eight years. 

Internet bots perform certain activities quickly and at scale. Bad bots, which are software applications capable of high-speed abuse, misuse, and attacks, grew to a total share of internet traffic of 30.2%. This is the highest level of bad bot activity since the beginning of Imperva’s reporting in 2013. 

“Bots have evolved rapidly since 2013, but with the advent of generative artificial intelligence, the technology will evolve at an even greater, more concerning pace over the next 10 years,” said Karl Triebes, senior vice president and GM of application security at Imperva. 

“Year-over-year, the proportion of bot traffic is growing and the disruptions caused by malicious automation results in tangible business risks – from brand reputation issues to reduced online sales and security risks for web applications, mobile apps, and APIs,” he said. 

The evolution of bad bots was staggering since the previous report, according to Imperva. The proportion of bad bots classified as “advanced” accounted for over half (51.2%) of all bad bot traffic, contrasting the mere 25.9% from the previous year’s report. 

In addition, 35% of all attacks in 2022 specifically targeted an application programming interface (API), and 17% of those attacks came from bots using “business logic”. This refers to bots that exploit flaws in the API to steal data and gain access to sensitive accounts. 

“Cybercriminals 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.”

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Bad bot attacks have targeted a wide range of industries in the past year. The top three industries experiencing the highest volume of bot attacks are travel, retail, and financial services. However, Healthcare and Law and government experienced a significant jump this year. 

“Every organization, regardless of size or industry, should be concerned about the rising volume of bad bots across the internet,” said Triebes.