Web scraping extracts valuable and often personal data from websites, web applications, and APIs, using either scraper tools or bots that crawl the web looking for data to capture. Once extracted, data can be used for either good or bad purposes. In this article, we’ll take a closer look at web scraping and the risks that malicious web scraping poses for your business. We’ll compare scraper tools and bots, look at detailed examples of malicious web scraping activities, and explain how to protect yourself against malicious web scraping.
What Is Web Scraping?
Web scraping is a type of data scraping that extracts data from websites using scraper tools and bots. It is also called website scraping, web content scraping, web harvesting, web data extraction, or web data mining. Web scraping can be performed either manually or via automation, or using a hybrid of the two.
Data—including text, images, video, and structured data (like tables)—can be extracted via web scraping. Such data can, with varying levels of difficulty, be scraped from any kind of website, including static and dynamic websites. The extracted data is then exported as structured data.
When used ethically, like for news or content aggregation, market research, or weather forecasting, web scraping can be beneficial. However, it can be malicious when used for harmful purposes, like price scraping and content scraping (more on these uses later.)
How Does Web Scraping Work?
Web scraping is carried out using a scraper tool or bot, and the basic process is the same for both:
- A person or bad actor deploys a scraper tool on a target website, or installs a bot.
- The scraper tool or bot sends automated requests to the website’s server requesting page-specific HTML code.
- The server responds with the HTML code as requested.
- The scraper tool or bot parses the supplied HTML code and extracts data—including databases—according to user-specific parameters.
- The scraper tool or bot then stores the extracted data in a structured format, such as a JSON or CSV file, for later use.
There are three scraping techniques: automated, manual, and hybrid. Manual scraping is the process of extracting data from websites manually, typically by copying and pasting or using web scraping tools that require human intervention. Automated scraping involves using software tools to extract data automatically from websites. Hybrid scraping combines both manual and automated techniques: manual methods are used to handle complex or dynamic elements of a website; automation is used for repetitive and simple tasks.
What Are Scraper Tools and Bots?
Scraper tools and bots are software programs designed to automatically extract data from websites by navigating through web pages and collecting the desired information. Scraper tools and bots can both facilitate large-scale, high-speed web scraping. They are easily confused because they can serve the same purpose—in this case, web scraping. However, scraper tools and bots are actually two different things.
Scraper tools are tools specifically developed for web scraping purposes. Bots are general-purpose software that can be designed to perform a variety of automated tasks, including web scraping. Let’s take a look at each in turn.
What Are Scraper Tools?
Scraper tools, also known as web scrapers, are programs, software, or pieces of code designed specifically to scrape or extract data. They feature a user interface and are typically built using programming languages such as Python, Ruby, Node.js, Golang, PHP, or Perl.
There are four classes of scraper tools:
- Open-source/pre-built web scrapers (e.g., BeautifulSoup, Scrapy)
- Off-the-shelf web scrapers (e.g., Import.io, ParseHub)
- Cloud web scrapers (e.g., Apify, ScrapingBee)
- Browser extension web scrapers (e.g., WebScraper.io, DataMiner)
As these tool classes suggest, scraper tools can be run as desktop applications or on a cloud server. They can be deployed using headless browsers, proxy servers, and mobile applications. Most options are free and do not require any coding or programming knowledge, making them easily accessible.
Scraper tools can also be categorized by their use case:
- Search engine scrapers (e.g., Google Search API, SERP API, Scrapebox)
- Social media scrapers (e.g., ScrapeStorm, PhantomBuster, Sociality.io)
- Image scrapers (e.g., Image Scraper, Google Images Download, Bing Image Search API)
- Ecommerce scrapers (e.g., Price2Spy, SellerSprite, Import.io)
- Video scrapers (e.g., YouTube Data API, Vimeo API, Dailymotion API)
- Web scraping frameworks or libraries (e.g., BeautifulSoup, Scrapy, Puppeteer)
- Music lyrics scrapers (e.g., LyricsGenius, Lyric-Scraper)
What Are Bots?
Unlike scraper tools that are specifically designed for web scraping, bots or robots are software/programs that can automate a wide range of tasks. They can gather weather updates, automate social media updates, generate content, process transactions—and also perform web scraping. Bots can be good or bad. Check out our article on good and bad bots and how to manage them for more information.
Bots don’t have a user interface, and are typically written in popular programming languages like Python, Java, C++, Lisp, Clojure, or PHP. Some bots can automate web scraping at scale and simultaneously cover their tracks by using different techniques like rotating proxies and CAPTCHA solving. Highly sophisticated bots can even scrape dynamic websites. Evidently, bots are powerful tools, whether for good or for bad.
Examples of good bots include:
- Chatbots (e.g., Facebook Messenger, ChatGPT)
- Voice bots (e.g., Siri, Alexa)
- Aggregators or news bots (e.g., Google News, AP News)
- Ecommerce bots (e.g., Keepa, Rakuten Slice)
- Search engine crawlers (e.g., Googlebot, Bingbot)
- Site monitoring bots (e.g., Uptime Robot, Pingdom)
- Social media crawlers (e.g., Facebook crawler, Pinterest crawler)
Examples of bad bots include:
- Content scrapers (more on these later)
- Spam bots (e.g., email spam bots, comment spam bots, forum spam bots)
- Account takeover bots (e.g., SentryMBA [credential stuffing], Medusa [brute-force bot], Spyrix Keylogger [credential harvesting bots])
- Social media bots (e.g., bot followers, Like/Retweet bots, political bot squads)
- Click fraud bots (e.g., Hummingbad, 3ve/Methuselah, Methbot)
- DDoS bots (e.g., Reaper/IoTroop, LizardStresser, XOR DDoS)
Comparison of Scraper Tools vs Bots
Scraper tools and bots can both perform web scraping, but have important differences. Let’s check out the differences between scraper tools and bots.
| Criteria | Scraper Tool | Bot |
| Purpose | Automated web scraping | Autonomous task automation for web scraping or other purposes |
| User Interface | User interface (UI), command line | No UI, standalone script |
| Technical skills | Some programming and web scraping know-how (no-code options available) | Advanced programming and web scraping know-how |
| Programming language | Python, Ruby, Node.js, Golang, PHP, and Perl | Python, Java, C++, Lisp, Clojure, and PHP |
| Good or bad | Depends on intent and approach | Good bots and bad bots both exist |
| Examples | BeautifulSoup, Scrapy | Googlebot, BingBot, Botnet |
| Benign use case | Weather forecast, price recommendation, job listings | Search engine indexing, ChatGPT, Siri/Alexa |
| Malicious use case | Web content scraping, price scraping | Spamming, DoS/DDoS, botnets |
What Is Malicious Web Scraping?
Malicious web scraping refers to any undesirable, unauthorized, or illegal use of web scraping. Examples include:
- Any unauthorized web scraping
- Web scraping that violates terms of service
- Web scraping that is used to facilitate other types of malicious attacks
- Any activity that causes severe negative effects to a server or service, including the one being scraped
This table will help you to determine if a particular web scraping activity is benign or malicious.
| Criteria | Consideration | Benign web scraping | Malicious web scraping |
| Authorization | Was approval granted before web scraping? | Yes | No |
| Intent | What was the original purpose for this web scraping? | Good | Bad |
| Approach | How was the web scraping carried out? | Ethically, harmless | Unethically, harmful |
| Impact | What was the impact of the web scraping approach on the scraped server or site? | None/slight | Severe |
Sometimes, even with authorization and good intent, the approach to carrying out web scraping may be inappropriate, resulting in a severe impact on the server or services being scraped.
Examples of Malicious Web Scraping
Malicious web scraping can seriously harm any business. It is important to know what to look out for so you can identify any cases of web scraping that could negatively affect your business. Here are some examples of malicious web scraping activities.
| Type | Activity | Intent |
| Social media user profile scraping | Scraping social media platforms to extract user profiles or personal information | Targeted advertising, identity profiling, identity theft |
| Healthcare data extraction | Scraping healthcare provider websites to access patient records, SSN, and medical information | Identity theft, blackmail, credit card fraud |
| API scraping | Scraping web or mobile app APIs | Reverse engineering or maliciously cloning apps |
| Email/contact scraping | Scraping email addresses and contact information from web pages | Spamming, phishing/smishing, malware distribution |
| Reviews/rating manipulation | Scraping reviews and rating sites or services | Posting fake positive reviews for self or fake negative reviews against competitors |
| Personal data harvesting | Scraping personal information like SSN, date of birth, and credit card details | Identity theft, impersonation, credit card fraud |
| Ad fraud scraping | Scraping advertising networks and platforms looking for ad placements | False ad impressions, click fraud |
| Protected content scraping | Scraping protected or gated content | Targeting log-in credentials and credit card information |
| Web scraping for malware distribution | Scraping content to create spoofing/phishing sites | Distributing malware disguised as software downloads |
| Automated account creation | Creating fake user accounts using web scraping techniques and credential stuffing | Spamming, account fraud, social engineering |
| Price scraping | Scraping ecommerce websites to gather pricing information | Undercutting competitors, scalping, anti-competitive practices |
Malicious web scraping can have significant negative impacts on websites and businesses. It can lead to server overload, website downtime and outage, lost revenue, damaged reputation, and legal action, as in the case of Regal Health in 2023.
What Is Price Scraping?
Price scraping is a prime example of malicious web scraping, in which pricing information is harvested from a site—for instance, an ecommerce site, travel portal, or ticketing agency. This is usually done to undercut the competition and gain an unfair price advantage.
How Price Scraping Impacts Businesses
There are several ways that price scraping can harm businesses:
- Unscrupulous competitors deploy price scraping bots to monitor and extract real-time pricing and inventory data from the competition. This puts pressure on servers and can lead to service disruption or website outage, resulting in poor user experience, cart abandonment, and non-conversion. Crashes caused by price scraping may account for up to 13% of abandoned carts.
- If customers already visited your competitor’s sites, retargeting ads can offer them the same products, redirecting your customers to your competitor’s site.
- Competitors who scrape pricing information can lure buyers by setting their own prices lower than yours in a marketplace. They will then rank higher on price comparison websites.
- Competitors can use price-scraped data for scalping. Scalping is the practice of buying large quantities of a popular product—often through automated systems or bots—and reselling them at a higher price.
- Scraper bots can pull data from hidden but unsecured databases, like customer and email lists. If your customer list and email list are scraped, your customers can end up becoming targets of coordinated malicious attacks or direct advertising from your competitors.
- Scraped data can be used to create a knock-off, replica, or spoofing site with a similar name e.g., www.aliexpresss.com for www.aliexpress.com (this is called typosquatting.) The spoofing site can then be used for phishing, for example by capturing and stealing the login credentials of unsuspecting buyers who mistakenly enter the wrong URL.
- Spoofing sites can be used to steal credit card information from users who complete checkout. But these customers will either never get what they paid for, or instead receive a knock-off, low-quality version. This can damage seller credibility and reputation, generate negative reviews, and land your website in the Ripoff Report.
Some of the most spoofed brands include (in no particular order):
- DHL
- FedEx
- PayPal
- A spoofing site impersonating your brand, armed with your pricing and product data, can field exorbitant prices and generate fake negative reviews. They can even flood the fake site with other malicious content to discredit your brand and misinform potential customers.
What Is Content Scraping?
Let’s look at another form of malicious web scraping. Content scraping is a form of web scraping where content is extracted from websites using specialized scraper tools and bots. For example, a website’s entire blog can be scraped and republished elsewhere without attribution or without using rel=canonical or noindex tags.
Examples of abusive scraping include:
- Copying and republishing content from other sites, without adding original content or value or citing the original source
- Copying content from other sites, slightly modifying it, and republishing it without attribution
- Reproducing content feeds from other sites
- Embedding or compiling content from other sites
How Content Scraping Impacts Businesses
There are several ways that content scraping can harm businesses:
- Your content can be copy-pasted verbatim without credit, meaning that the scraper site takes credit for your hard work.
- Your entire website(s) could be cloned using content scraping techniques, which can be used maliciously to spoof users for phishing.
- Your customers into giving away personal information like credit card details or social security numbers (SSN) via typosquatting. This method was used by convicted felon, Hushpuppi, who engaged in widespread cyber fraud and business email compromise schemes.
- If your website is spoofed, fake bot traffic could commit click fraud and ad fraud. This strategy can make it look like your business itself is engaged in click or ad fraud.
- Your SEO rankings could be damaged if content scraping makes you compete for visibility and organic traffic against your own duplicate content. If you’re outranked by duplicate content, you may lose revenue to criminals profiting from your hard work. Google does countermeasures in place, but they are not 100% guaranteed.
- If content scraping on your website or online assets results in a data breach, you risk facing a class action lawsuit, paying damages, and losing hard-earned customer trust and loyalty.
How to Protect Against Web Scraping
To protect your website against web scraping, you can implement a number of robust security measures. We can sort these techniques into two categories: DIY and advanced. On the DIY end, you might already be familiar with CAPTCHA, rate limiting (limiting the number of requests a user can send to your server in a given time period), and user behavior analysis to detect and block suspicious activities.
More advanced techniques include server-side techniques such as regularly changing HTML structures, hiding or encrypting certain data, and ensuring you have a strong, updated robots.txt file that clearly states what bots are allowed to do on your website.
However, two major challenges to preventing web scraping exist. Firstly, some web scraping prevention methods can also impact real users and legitimate crawlers. Secondly, scraper tools and bots are becoming more sophisticated and better at evading detection, for example, by using rotating proxies or CAPTCHA solving to cover their tracks.
DIY Protection Measures Against Web Scraping
Below is a table of DIY protective measures that you can immediately take to prevent or minimize web scraping activities, especially price scraping and content scraping.
| Step number | Action | Description |
| 1 | Stay updated | Track the latest web scraping techniques by following blogs (like ScraperAPI or Octoparse) that teach them |
| 2 | Search for your own content | Search for phrases, sentences, or paragraphs in your post enclosed in quotes |
| 3 | Use plagiarism checkers | Copyscape lets you search for copies of your web pages by URL or by copy-pasting text |
| 4 | Check for typosquatting | Regularly check for misspellings of your domain name to prevent content theft and typo hijacking |
| 5 | Implement CAPTCHA (but don’t include the solution in the HTML markup) | CAPTCHA differentiates humans from bots using puzzles bots can’t ordinarily solve. Google’s reCAPTCHA is a good option. |
| 6 | Set up notifications for pingbacks on WordPress sites | Pingback notifications alert you to use of your published backlinks and allow you to manually approve which of those sites can link to yours. This helps to prevent link spam and low-quality backlinks. |
| 7 | Set up Google Alerts | Get notified whenever phrases or terms that you’re using often get mentioned anywhere on the web. |
| 8 | Gate your content | Put content behind a paywall or form, requiring sign-in to gain access. Confirm new account sign-ups by email. |
| 9 | Monitor unusual activity | An excessive number of requests, page views, or searches from one IP address might indicate bot activity. Monitor this via network requests to your site or using integrated web analytics tools like Google Analytics. |
| 10 | Implement rate limiting | Allow users and verified scrapers a limited number of actions per time. This limits network traffic. |
| 11 | Block scraping services | Block access from IP addresses of known scraping services, but mask the real reason for the block. |
| 13 | Create a honeypot | Honeypots are virtual traps or decoys set up to distract or fool malicious bots and learn how they work. |
| 14 | Update your website/API | Dynamic websites and updated HTML/APIs make it harder for malicious bots to scrape content. |
| 15 | Disallow web scraping | Enact via your robots.txt file (e.g., www.yourURL.com/robots.txt), terms of service, or a legal warning. |
| 16 | Contact, then report offenders | Reach out to the content thief letting them know they’re in violation of your terms of service. You can also file a DMCA takedown request. |
While these DIY measures can help, their impact is limited in the face of ever-evolving threats like web scraping. Advanced, enterprise-grade web scraping protections are more effective, ensuring the security, integrity, and competitive edge that your site offers customers.
Advanced Protection Measures Against Web Scraping
Advanced web scraping solutions like WAF and bot protection provide enterprise-grade web scraping protection. They help to further protect your assets against unethical web scraping and can be used in conjunction with bot management best practices and other DIY anti-scraping measures.
- Web application firewall (WAF): A comprehensive WAF protects your web applications and APIs against OWASP Top 10 and zero-day attacks. A web application firewall acts as an intermediary, detecting and scanning malicious requests before web applications and servers accept them and respond to them. This helps to protect your web servers and users.
As a Layer 7 defense, Gcore’s WAF employs real-time monitoring and advanced machine-learning techniques to secure your web applications and APIs against cyber threats such as credentials theft, unauthorized access, data leaks, and web scraping.
- Bot protection: Effective bot protection prevents server overload resulting from aggressive bot traffic/activity. A bot protection service uses a set of algorithms to isolate and remove unwanted bot traffic that has already infiltrated your perimeter. This is essential for preventing attacks like web scraping, account takeover, and API data scraping.
Gcore’s comprehensive bot protection service offers clients best-in-class L3/L4/L7 protection across their networks, transports, and application layers. Users can also choose between low-level or high-level bot protection. Low-level bot protection uses quantitative analytics to detect and block suspicious sessions while high-level bot protection utilizes a rate limiter and additional checks to safeguard your servers.
Bot protection is highly effective against web scraping, account takeover, form submission abuse, API data scraping, and TLS session attacks. It helps you to maintain uninterrupted service even during intense attacks, allowing you to focus on running your business while mitigating the threats. Bot protection is customizable, quick to deploy, and cost effective.
Conclusion
Web scraping protection is essential for all businesses because it ensures the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of your business and customer data. Unethical web scraping poses a serious threat to this ideal by using malicious scraper tools and bots to access and extract data without permission.
Gcore’s advanced WAF and bot protection solutions offer advanced protection against web scraping. Try our advanced web scraping protection services for free today and protect your web resources and customers from malicious web scraping activities of any size and complexity.
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It combines innovation and practicality to address the needs of modern businesses.Curious to learn more about WAAP? Check out our ebook for cybersecurity best practices, the most common threats to look out for, and how WAAP can safeguard your businesses’ digital assets. Or, get in touch with our team to learn more about Gcore WAAP.Learn why WAAP is essential for modern businesses with a free ebook
How AI helps prevent API attacks
APIs have become an integral part of modern digital infrastructure, and it can be easy to take their security for granted. But, unfortunately, APIs are a popular target for attackers. Hackers can use APIs to access crucial data and services, and breaching APIs allows attackers to bypass traditional security controls.Most companies focus on speed of development and deployment ahead of security when crafting APIs, making them vulnerable to issues like insecure authentication, poor validation, or misconfigured endpoints, which attackers can abuse. Additionally, the interconnected nature of APIs creates multiple endpoints, widening the attack surface and creating additional points of entry that attackers can exploit.As threats evolve and the attack surface grows to include more API endpoints, integrating AI threat detection and mitigation is an absolute must for businesses to take serious, deliberate action against API cyberattacks. Let’s find out why.Staying ahead of zero-day API attacksOf all the cyber attacks that commonly threaten APIs, zero-day attacks, leveraging unknown vulnerabilities, are probably the toughest to defeat. Traditional solutions rely more on the existence of preconfigured rules or signatures along with human interference to detect and block such attacks. This approach often fails against novel threats and can block legitimate traffic, leaving applications vulnerable and making APIs inaccessible to users.APIs must balance between allowing legitimate users access and maintaining security. AI and ML technologies excel at identifying zero-day attacks based on pattern and behavior analysis rather than known signatures. For instance, heuristic algorithms can detect anomalies, such as sudden spikes in unusual traffic or behaviors indicative of malicious intent.Consider the following example: A certain IP address makes an abnormally large number of requests to a rarely accessed endpoint. Even without prior knowledge of the IP or attack vector, an AI/ML-enhanced solution can flag the activity as suspicious and block it proactively. Using minimal indicators, such as frequency patterns or traffic anomalies, AI can stop attackers before they fully exploit vulnerabilities. Additionally, this means that only suspicious IPs are blocked, and legitimate users can continue to access APIs unimpeded.The risks of shadow APIsOne of the biggest risks is shadow APIs, which are endpoints that exist but aren't documented or monitored. These can arise from configuration mistakes, forgotten updates, or even rogue development practices. These unknown APIs are the ideal target for Layer 7 attacks, as they are often left undefended, making them easy targets.AI-powered API discovery tools map both known and unknown API endpoints, enabling the grouping and management of these endpoints so sensitive APIs can be properly secured. This level of visibility is critical to securing systems against API-targeting attacks; without it, businesses are left in the dark.API discovery as a critical security practiceWAAP with AI/ML capabilities excels in API security because it accurately checks and analyzes API traffic. The Gcore API discovery engine offers 97 to 99 percent accuracy, mapping APIs in users’ domains and using data to recommend policies to help secure APIs.How heuristics enhance WAAP AI capabilities to protect APIsWhile AI and ML form the backbone of modern WAAPs, heuristic methods complement them in enhancing detection accuracy. Heuristics allow the system to inspect granular behaviors, such as mouse clicks or scrolling patterns, which distinguish legitimate users from bots.For example, most scraping attacks involve automated scripts that interact with APIs in predictable and repetitive manners. In those cases, WAAP can use request patterns or user action monitoring to identify the script with high accuracy. Heuristics may define bots by checking how users interact with page elements, such as buttons or forms, and flagging those that behave unnaturally.This layered approach ensures that the most sophisticated automated attack attempts are caught in the net and mitigated without affecting legitimate traffic.Protect your APIs with the click of a button using Gcore WAAPAI offers proactive, intelligent solutions that can address the modern complexities of cybersecurity. These technologies empower organizations to secure APIs against even the most sophisticated threats, including zero-day vulnerabilities and undiscovered APIs.Interested in protecting your APIs with WAAP? Download our ebook to discover cybersecurity best practices, the most prevalent threats, and how WAAP can protect your business’s digital infrastructure, including APIs. Or, reach out to our team to learn more about Gcore WAAP.Discover why WAAP is a must-have for API protection
11 simple tips for securing your APIs
A vast 84% of organizations have experienced API security incidents in the past year. APIs (application programming interfaces) are the backbone of modern technology, allowing seamless interaction between diverse software platforms. However, this increased connectivity comes with a downside: a higher risk of security breaches, which can include injection attacks, credential stuffing, and L7 DDoS attacks, as well as the ever-growing threat of AI-based attacks.Fortunately, developers and IT teams can implement DIY API protection. Mitigating vulnerabilities involves using secure coding techniques, conducting thorough testing, and applying strong security protocols and frameworks. Alternatively, you can simply use a WAAP (web application and API protection) solution for specialized, one-click, robust API protection.This article explains 11 practical tips that can help protect your APIs from security threats and hacking attempts, with examples of commands and sample outputs to provide API security.#1 Implement authentication and authorizationUse robust authentication mechanisms to verify user identity and authorization strategies like OAuth 2.0 to manage access to resources. Using OAuth 2.0, you can set up a token-based authentication system where clients request access tokens using credentials. # Requesting an access token curl -X POST https://yourapi.com/oauth/token \ -d "grant_type=client_credentials" \ -d "client_id=your_client_id" \ -d "client_secret=your_client_secret" Sample output: { "access_token": "eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9...", "token_type": "bearer", "expires_in": 3600 } #2 Secure communication with HTTPSEncrypting data in transit using HTTPS can help prevent eavesdropping and man-in-the-middle attacks. Enabling HTTPS may involve configuring your web server with SSL/TLS certificates, such as Let’s Encrypt with nginx. sudo certbot --nginx -d yourapi.com #3 Validate and sanitize inputValidating and sanitizing all user inputs protects against injection and other attacks. For a Node.js API, use express-validator middleware to validate incoming data. app.post('/api/user', [ body('email').isEmail(), body('password').isLength({ min: 5 }) ], (req, res) => { const errors = validationResult(req); if (!errors.isEmpty()) { return res.status(400).json({ errors: errors.array() }); } // Proceed with user registration }); #4 Use rate limitingLimit the number of requests a client can make within a specified time frame to prevent abuse. The express-rate-limit library implements rate limiting in Express.js. const rateLimit = require('express-rate-limit'); const apiLimiter = rateLimit({ windowMs: 15 * 60 * 1000, // 15 minutes max: 100 }); app.use('/api/', apiLimiter); #5 Undertake regular security auditsRegularly audit your API and its dependencies for vulnerabilities. Runnpm auditin your Node.js project to detect known vulnerabilities in your dependencies. npm audit Sample output: found 0 vulnerabilities in 1050 scanned packages #6 Implement access controlsImplement configurations so that users can only access resources they are authorized to view or edit, typically through roles or permissions. The two more common systems are Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) and Attribute-Based Access Control (ABAC) for a more granular approach.You might also consider applying zero-trust security measures such as the principle of least privilege (PoLP), which gives users the minimal permissions necessary to perform their tasks. Multi-factor authentication (MFA) adds an extra layer of security beyond usernames and passwords.#7 Monitor and log activityMaintain comprehensive logs of API activity with a focus on both performance and security. By treating logging as a critical security measure—not just an operational tool—organizations can gain deeper visibility into potential threats, detect anomalies more effectively, and accelerate incident response.#8 Keep dependencies up-to-dateRegularly update all libraries, frameworks, and other dependencies to mitigate known vulnerabilities. For a Node.js project, updating all dependencies to their latest versions is vital. npm update #9 Secure API keysIf your API uses keys for access, we recommend that you make sure that they are securely stored and managed. Modern systems often utilize dynamic key generation techniques, leveraging algorithms to automatically produce unique and unpredictable keys. This approach enhances security by reducing the risk of brute-force attacks and improving efficiency.#10 Conduct penetration testingRegularly test your API with penetration testing to identify and fix security vulnerabilities. By simulating real-world attack scenarios, your organizations can systematically identify vulnerabilities within various API components. This proactive approach enables the timely mitigation of security risks, reducing the likelihood of discovering such issues through post-incident reports and enhancing overall cybersecurity resilience.#11 Simply implement WAAPIn addition to taking the above steps to secure your APIs, a WAAP (web application and API protection) solution can defend your system against known and unknown threats by consistently monitoring, detecting, and mitigating risks. With advanced algorithms and machine learning, WAAP safeguards your system from attacks like SQL injection, DDoS, and bot traffic, which can compromise the integrity of your APIs.Take your API protection to the next levelThese steps will help protect your APIs against common threats—but security is never one-and-done. Regular reviews and updates are essential to stay ahead of evolving vulnerabilities. To keep on top of the latest trends, we encourage you to read more of our top cybersecurity tips or download our ultimate guide to WAAP.Implementing specialized cybersecurity solutions such as WAAP, which combines web application firewall (WAF), bot management, Layer 7 DDoS protection, and API security, is the best way to protect your assets. Designed to tackle the complex challenges of API threats in the age of AI, Gcore WAAP is an advanced solution that keeps you ahead of security threats.Discover why WAAP is a non-negotiable with our free ebook
What are zero-day attacks? Risks, prevention tips, and new trends
Zero-day attack is a term for any attack that targets a vulnerability in software or hardware that has yet to be discovered by the vendor or developer. The term “zero-day” stems from the idea that the developer has had zero days to address or patch the vulnerability before it is exploited.In a zero-day attack, an attacker finds a vulnerability before a developer discovers and patches itThe danger of zero-day attacks lies in their unknownness. Because the vulnerabilities they target are undiscovered, traditional defense mechanisms or firewalls may not detect them as no specific patch exists, making attack success rates higher than for known attack types. This makes proactive and innovative security measures, like AI-enabled WAAP, crucial for organizations to stay secure.Why are zero-day attacks a threat to businesses?Zero-day attacks pose a unique challenge for businesses due to their unpredictable nature. Since these exploits take advantage of previously unknown vulnerabilities, organizations have no warning or time to deploy a patch before they are targeted. This makes zero-day attacks exceptionally difficult to detect and mitigate, leaving businesses vulnerable to potentially severe consequences. As a result, zero-day attacks can have devastating consequences for organizations of all sizes. They pose financial, reputational, and regulatory risks that can be difficult to recover from, including the following:Financial and operational damage: Ransomware attacks leveraging zero-day vulnerabilities can cripple operations and lead to significant financial losses due to data breach fines. According to recent studies, the average cost of a data breach in 2025 has surpassed $5 million, with zero-day exploits contributing significantly to these figures.Reputation and trust erosion: Beyond monetary losses, zero-day attacks erode customer trust. A single breach can damage an organization’s reputation, leading to customer churn and lost opportunities.Regulatory implications: With strict regulations like GDPR in the EU and similar frameworks emerging globally, organizations face hefty fines for data breaches. Zero-day vulnerabilities, though difficult to predict, do not exempt businesses from compliance obligations.The threat is made clear by recent successful examples of zero-day attacks. The Log4j vulnerability (Log4Shell), discovered in 2021, affected millions of applications worldwide and was widely exploited. In 2023, the MOVEit Transfer exploit was used to compromise data from numerous government and corporate systems. These incidents demonstrate how zero-day attacks can have far-reaching consequences across different industries.New trends in zero-day attacksAs cybercriminals become more sophisticated, zero-day attacks continue to evolve. New methods and technologies are making it easier for attackers to exploit vulnerabilities before they are discovered. The latest trends in zero-day attacks include AI-powered attacks, expanding attack surfaces, and sophisticated multi-vendor attacks.AI-powered attacksAttackers are increasingly leveraging artificial intelligence to identify and exploit vulnerabilities faster than ever before. AI tools can analyze vast amounts of code and detect potential weaknesses in a fraction of the time it would take a human. Moreover, AI can automate the creation of malware, making attacks more frequent and harder to counter.For example, AI-driven malware can adapt in real time to avoid detection, making it particularly effective in targeting enterprise networks and cloud-based applications. Hypothetically, an attacker could use an AI algorithm to scan for weaknesses in widely used SaaS applications, launching an exploit before a patch is even possible.Expanding attack surfacesThe digital transformation continues to expand the attack surface for zero-day exploits. APIs, IoT devices, and cloud-based services are increasingly targeted, as they often rely on interconnected systems with complex dependencies. A single unpatched vulnerability in an API could provide attackers with access to critical data or applications.Sophisticated multi-vector attacksCybercriminals are combining zero-day exploits with other tactics, such as phishing or social engineering, to create multi-vector attacks. This approach increases the likelihood of success and makes defense efforts more challenging.Prevent zero-day attacks with AI-powered WAAPWAAP solutions are becoming a cornerstone of modern cybersecurity, particularly in addressing zero-day vulnerabilities. Here’s how they help:Behavioral analytics: WAAP solutions use behavioral models to detect unusual traffic patterns, blocking potential exploits before they can cause damage.Automated patching: By shielding applications with virtual patches, WAAP can provide immediate protection against vulnerabilities while a permanent fix is developed.API security: With APIs increasingly targeted, WAAP’s ability to secure API endpoints is critical. It ensures that only authorized requests are processed, reducing the risk of exploitation.How WAAP stops AI-driven zero-day attacksAI is not just a tool for attackers—it is also a powerful ally for defenders. Machine learning algorithms can analyze user behavior and network activity to identify anomalies in real time. These systems can detect and block suspicious activities that might indicate an attempted zero-day exploit.Threat intelligence platforms powered by AI can also predict emerging vulnerabilities by analyzing trends and known exploits. This enables organizations to prepare for potential attacks before they occur.At Gcore, our WAAP solution combines these features to provide comprehensive protection. By leveraging cutting-edge AI and machine learning, Gcore WAAP detects and mitigates threats in real time, keeping web applications and APIs secure even from zero-day attacks.More prevention techniquesBeyond WAAP, layering protection techniques can further enhance your business’ ability to ward off zero-day attacks. Consider the following measures:Implement a robust patch management system so that known vulnerabilities are addressed promptly.Conduct regular security assessments and penetration testing to help identify potential weaknesses before attackers can exploit them.Educate employees about phishing and other social engineering tactics to decease the likelihood of successful attacks.Protect your business against zero-day attacks with GcoreZero-day attacks pose a significant threat to businesses, with financial, reputational, and regulatory consequences. The rise of AI-powered cyberattacks and expanding digital attack surfaces make these threats even more pressing. Organizations must adopt proactive security measures, including AI-driven defense mechanisms like WAAP, to protect their critical applications and data. By leveraging behavioral analytics, automated patching, and advanced threat intelligence, businesses can minimize their risk and stay ahead of attackers.Gcore’s AI-powered WAAP provides the robust protection your business needs to defend against zero-day attacks. With real-time threat detection, virtual patching, and API security, Gcore WAAP ensures that your web applications remain protected against even the most advanced cyber threats, including zero-day threats. Don’t wait until it’s too late—secure your business today with Gcore’s cutting-edge security solutions.Discover how WAAP can help stop zero-day attacks
Why do bad actors carry out Minecraft DDoS attacks?
One of the most played video games in the world, Minecraft, relies on servers that are frequently a target of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks. But why would malicious actors target Minecraft servers? In this article, we’ll look at why these servers are so prone to DDoS attacks and uncover the impact such attacks have on the gaming community and broader cybersecurity landscape. For a comprehensive analysis and expert tips, read our ultimate guide to preventing DDoS attacks on Minecraft servers.Disruption for financial gainFinancial exploitation is a typical motivator for DDoS attacks in Minecraft. Cybercriminals frequently demand ransom to stop their attacks. Server owners, especially those with lucrative private or public servers, may feel pressured to pay to restore normalcy. In some cases, bad actors intentionally disrupt competitors to draw players to their own servers, leveraging downtime for monetary advantage.Services that offer DDoS attacks for hire make these attacks more accessible and widespread. These malicious services target Minecraft servers because the game is so popular, making it an attractive and easy option for attackers.Player and server rivalriesRivalries within the Minecraft ecosystem often escalate to DDoS attacks, driven by competition among players, servers, hosts, and businesses. Players may target opponents during tournaments to disrupt their gaming experience, hoping to secure prize money for themselves. Similarly, players on one server may initiate attacks to draw members to their server and harm the reputation of other servers. Beyond individual players, server hosts also engage in DDoS attacks to disrupt and induce outages for their rivals, subsequently attempting to poach their customers. On a bigger scale, local pirate servers may target gaming service providers entering new markets to harm their brand and hold onto market share. These rivalries highlight the competitive and occasionally antagonistic character of the Minecraft community, where the stakes frequently surpass in-game achievements.Personal vendettas and retaliationPersonal conflicts can occasionally be the source of DDoS attacks in Minecraft. In these situations, servers are targeted in retribution by individual gamers or disgruntled former employees. These attacks are frequently the result of complaints about unsolved conflicts, bans, or disagreements over in-game behavior. Retaliation-driven DDoS events can cause significant disruption, although lower in scope than attacks with financial motivations.Displaying technical masterySome attackers carry out DDoS attacks to showcase their abilities. Minecraft is a perfect testing ground because of its large player base and community-driven server infrastructure. Successful strikes that demonstrate their skills enhance reputations within some underground communities. Instead of being a means to an end, the act itself becomes a badge of honor for those involved.HacktivismHacktivists—people who employ hacking as a form of protest—occasionally target Minecraft servers to further their political or social goals. These attacks are meant to raise awareness of a subject rather than be driven by personal grievances or material gain. To promote their message, they might, for instance, assault servers that are thought to support unfair policies or practices. This would be an example of digital activism. Even though they are less frequent, these instances highlight the various reasons why DDoS attacks occur.Data theftMinecraft servers often hold significant user data, including email addresses, usernames, and sometimes even payment information. Malicious actors sometimes launch DDoS attacks as a smokescreen to divert server administrators’ attention from their attempts to breach the server and steal confidential information. This dual-purpose approach disrupts gameplay and poses significant risks to user privacy and security, making data theft one of the more insidious motives behind such attacks.Securing the Minecraft ecosystemDDoS attacks against Minecraft are motivated by various factors, including personal grudges, data theft, and financial gain. Every attack reveals wider cybersecurity threats, interferes with gameplay, and damages community trust. Understanding these motivations can help server owners take informed steps to secure their servers, but often, investing in reliable DDoS protection is the simplest and most effective way to guarantee that Minecraft remains a safe and enjoyable experience for players worldwide. By addressing the root causes and improving server resilience, stakeholders can mitigate the impact of such attacks and protect the integrity of the game.Gcore offers robust, multi-layered security solutions designed to shield gaming communities from the ever-growing threat of DDoS attacks. Founded by gamers for gamers, Gcore understands the industry’s unique challenges. Our tools enable smooth gameplay and peace of mind for both server owners and players.Want an in-depth look at how to secure your Minecraft servers?Download our ultimate guide
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