Christmas shopping hit by AI-enhanced scalping bots

Research by Imperva, a Thales company, has suggested that bots are having a significant impact on the Christmas holiday shopping experience for UK consumers.

A study indicates that 71% of UK consumers believe bots are contributing to difficulties in securing popular Christmas presents. The phenomenon, known as "scalping," involves cybercriminals using bots to purchase desirable items quickly, which are then resold at inflated prices.

Data reveals that 40% of consumers have faced challenges when attempting to buy coveted gifts, only to find them sold out. As a result, 19% of surveyed individuals ended up purchasing a more expensive alternative, 13% bought a less meaningful gift, and 10% resorted to paying inflated prices on secondary marketplaces. Another 10% were unable to purchase their desired gift, leading to disappointment for a loved one.

Imperva warns that the situation is likely to intensify this festive season, as AI-enhanced "Grinch bots" are deployed to target high-demand items more efficiently. According to Imperva, the resale prices for some of these popular gifts can escalate by up to 105%.

"It's a Christmas tale as old as time. A child has their heart set on a particular toy; it sells out; parents frantically visit every shop to find the last one," said Tim Ayling, Vice President EMEA at Imperva. "But with so much shopping done online now, the scale of this problem has ballooned, with automated bots able to scalp the most in-demand presents for a healthy profit. AI is making the situation even worse, making bots faster, more targeted and more effective, leaving an increasing number of disappointed children or parents out of pocket."

The impact extends beyond consumers to retailers as well, with bots negatively affecting retailers' reputations and profits when customers are unable to purchase items from their sites. In light of this, Imperva has outlined some strategies that retailers can implement to combat the issue.

These include identifying risks and evaluating traffic to find site vulnerabilities, blocking outdated user agents, limiting access through proxy services, implementing rate limiting to control traffic flow, and monitoring for signs of automation and headless browsers.

"Retailers have a duty of care to protect customers from scalping and inflated prices, particularly around Christmas," Ayling stated. "By identifying high risk areas and analysing buying behaviour, retailers can limit the amount of bot traffic on their site. This will be vital moving forwards as AI bots will only get better at scalping as they mature, and companies that don't have measures in place now will lose customers to rivals."

The research, which aimed to gauge consumer sentiment and understand ongoing challenges, surveyed 2,000 UK adults through Opinium. Additionally, price increases were referenced by comparing the original and resale prices of items such as the PlayStation 5 disc edition.