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Bots Are Driving Web Traffic More Than Humans, Report Says

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

We're going to look now at a couple of kinds of traffic. In a moment, we'll hear about the unexpected benefits of gridlock in Indonesia's capital but first, let's look at the variety of traffic on the Internet.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

A new report out this week suggests that nearly two-thirds of Internet traffic isn't people clicking mouses or tapping on screens; it's actually bots. Bots are automated software programs that comb the Internet; sometimes doing good, like Internet searches, people googling; and sometimes they're malicious - viruses or worms, spamming and stealing personal data.

MONTAGNE: The new study, from tech company Incapsula, finds that bot activity is on the rise, up 20 percent over last year.

GREENE: But it notes that much of that rise is of the positive kind. They see less spamming activity than they did in 2012. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.