"The UK is one of the world's worst performers when it comes to protecting against bots - though most countries are pretty poor. That's according to DataDome, which states that only 1.8% of large UK domains are fully protected against bots, compared with a Europe-wide average of 2.5% and a global average of 2.8%. Bigger organizations are no better than smaller ones, with only 2% of domains with more than 30 million monthly visits fully protected."
"And it's an increasing issue. AI-driven bot traffic is becoming the norm, said DataDome, with AI bot and crawler traffic having risen from 2.6% of verified bot traffic in January this year to more than 10.1% by August. The company said it detected nearly 1.7 billion requests from OpenAI crawlers alone in a single month - scraping web content, draining server resources, and exposing proprietary data."
"Earlier this year, the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) warned of a developing digital divide between systems keeping pace with AI-enabled threats and those that are more vulnerable. "Our data on low bot protection rates provides concrete evidence that this is already happening, proving that many UK businesses are ill-equipped for the next wave of AI-driven cyberattacks," said Jérôme Segura, VP of threat research at DataDome."
Only 1.8% of large UK domains are fully protected against bots, below the Europe-wide average of 2.5% and global average of 2.8%. Domains with more than 30 million monthly visits show similarly low protection at 2%. AI-driven bot and crawler traffic rose from 2.6% of verified bot traffic in January to over 10.1% by August. Nearly 1.7 billion requests from OpenAI crawlers were detected in a single month, causing scraping, server load, and data exposure. Legacy defenses are failing, protection fell from 8.4% in 2024 to 2.8% in 2025. Systemic issues include resource-strapped SMEs, a cybersecurity skills gap, and underinvestment.
Read at IT Pro
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