What are bad bots and how can we stop them?

A cybersecurity expert gives the lowdown on bad bots and the havoc they can wreak.

What’s the first thing that comes to mind when someone mentions bots? They are, as Pam Murphy, CEO of cybersecurity firm Imperva explained, pieces of code programmed to do repetitive or automated tasks that simulate the behaviour of human internet users.

We might think of clever bots like ChatGPT or useful ones like customer service chat bots, or perhaps even annoying ones like the spam bots on Twitter trying to sell herbal remedies or get you to invest in their crypto. But what about bots behaving badly?

Pam detailed bad bots of every kind, from those that can carry out identity theft through ATAs (account takeover attacks) to so-called ‘Grinch bots’ that create scarcity around coveted consumer items by buying up as much online inventory as possible in order to drive up the resale price.

ATA’s, explained the CEO, are “where brute force or credential stuffing activities happen to try and force access to a user’s account, ultimately, with the objective of stealing those usernames and passwords to commit fraud”.

Meanwhile, Grinch bots are equally destructive. Pam described cases where “the retailer struggled to identify the bad bot from an actual human and so they were successful in going out and taking up the inventory with the express purpose of […] reselling them for three to four to five times the market value on a reseller website”.

To learn more about bad bots – and how to stop them – listen on the player below.

Pam Murphy, CEO of cybersecurity firm Imperva, was in conversation with Adam Bluestein, contributing writer for Fast Company, on the FullSTK stage at Web Summit 2022.

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Main image of a vintage computer with a white skull and crossbones on the monitor: Web Summit