DataDome reveals that a staggering 66% of UK websites are unable to block simple bot attacks. As a result, these businesses are left vulnerable to fraud, account breaches, and countless other risks.
The security vendor used its BotTester tool to test more than 2400 of the biggest sites in the country. These sites belong to various industries like banking, ticketing, e-commerce, and gambling.
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Only 8% managed to effectively block all bot requests, while a staggering 69% allowed all nine types of bots to pass through. DataDome claimed that almost one quarter (23%) were able to detect at least some of the bots.
The e-commerce and classified ads sectors performed the worst, allowing more than 70% of the malicious bot traffic and failing all nine bot tests. Gambling sites, on the other hand, excelled in their defense mechanisms by successfully blocking all bot variations generated by the BotTester tool, representing an impressive 29% of the total.
BotTester’s most successful creations were fake Chrome bots that were able to bypass the defenses of 90% of the tested sites.
Antoine Vastel, the Head of Research at DataDome, emphasizes that UK companies are ill-equipped to handle the immense financial and reputational consequences that malicious bots can inflict.
“From ticket scalping and inventory hoarding, to account fraud, bad bots wreak chaos on consumers and businesses alike,” he added.
Businesses that fail to effectively handle bad bots not only face potential damage to their reputation but also put their customers at unnecessary risk. Immediate action is necessary to safeguard against this escalating danger.
Imperva reports that there has been a steady increase in the proportion of malicious bots among all internet traffic, reaching approximately 30% today.
Advanced bots are responsible for the majority of malicious traffic, costing global organizations billions of dollars every year. Identifying these becomes more challenging since they are specifically crafted to imitate authentic human actions.
Source: Infosecurity magazine, DataDome