Business impacts of bot attacks explored in new report
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- Published: Friday, 13 August 2021 08:27
Netacea, the bot detection and mitigation specialist, has released results from a new survey-based report that reveals the high price that businesses pay because of bot traffic. According to survey respondents, automated bots operated by malicious actors cost businesses an average of 3.6 percent of their annual revenue.
The report, The Bot Management Review: What are bots costing your business?, surveyed 440 businesses across the travel, entertainment, eCommerce, financial services and telecoms sectors in the US and the UK. It found that every sector had a substantial bot problem, with two-thirds of businesses detecting website attacks. 46 percent of respondents reported mobile apps had been attacked, and 23 percent - mostly in the financial services - said bots had attacked their APIs.
While scalper bots - which automate the purchase of inventory such as game consoles and other limited availability goods faster than is possible for any legitimate user - continue to dominate headlines in 2021, businesses have been affected by all types of bots. These include account checker bots which use stolen usernames and passwords to take over accounts, sniper bots that monitor activity and swoop in at the last moment, and scraper bots that extract content and data from websites.
The Netacea research also highlighted:
- Over 80 percent of businesses reported that customer satisfaction had been negatively affected by bot activity, in particular scalper and sniper bots.
- Only around 5 percent of security budgets are dedicated to bot mitigation, though for larger firms it’s higher, at up to 20 percent.
- Account checker bots are the most popular form of bot attacks, taking advantage of data breaches and leaked passwords to compromise customer accounts.
- Most worrying is the time it takes to discover attacks. On average, more than 14 weeks pass between a successful attack and its detection, making it difficult to limit the damage done to a business’s customer satisfaction, reputation, and bottom line.
