Tag Archive for: human

How to Distinguish Bot vs. Human Traffic

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Not so long ago, bots were considered a modern-day convenience. Understandably so, bots have the potential to make enterprises more efficient with customer service or help to improve an enterprise’s standing on popular search engines. However, with their growing sophistication and scale in recent times, bots and  botnets have become a source of concern for enterprises around the globe. In fact, bots now comprise nearly half of all internet traffic. This shows that enterprises need to recognize bots are the “new normal” on the internet and prepare accordingly. 

These malicious software applications are designed to mimic human behavior on websites or apps. Usually deployed by cybercriminals to carry out malicious activities such as spreading misinformation, conducting DDoS attacks or inventory scraping, automated bad bots have now become one of the biggest threats to enterprises.  

Identifying bot traffic within your website traffic is vital because it allows you to take action and minimize the impact of the bot attack. 

In this blog post, we will tell you about the challenges of detecting bot traffic and tips that can help you spot bot traffic. You’ll also find tools that can help monitor bot vs. human traffic.

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What is Bot Traffic?

Put simply, bot traffic is non-human traffic generated by robots to web pages and apps. Bot traffic can be beneficial or harmful, depending on the purpose of the bots. Usually, bots perform repetitive tasks automatically without human involvement, like web crawlers. This automation enables a bot’s human overlord to conduct a variety of tasks.  

Good bots can be used for marketing and customer service functions, data mining, and fraud prevention. However, malicious bots can also be used for credential stuffing, web content scraping or data scraping, and launching denial of service (DDoS) or account takeover (ATO) attacks. Specific “spam bots” can also be used to control a narrative on social media or…

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Survivors work to prevent human trafficking, aid victims

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Survivors work to prevent human trafficking, aid victims

By Lauren Monsen

Left: Holly Austin Gibbs (© Kim Van Oosten/Catholic Health Association) Right: Tanya Gould (Courtesy of Tanya Gould)

Victims of human trafficking come from every region of the globe. Increasingly, survivors are taking the lead in the fight against the crime and in helping its victims to heal.

To understand the scope of the problem, caused primarily by criminals subjecting victims to forced labor or sex trafficking, one need only see the International Labour Organization estimates, which say that at any given time in 2021:

  • 21 million people worked in a factory, on a farm or as a domestic worker under threat of penalty or harm.

  • 6 million people — adults and children (99% female) — were forced to participate in the sex industry.

Signs recruit women to leave Manila, the Philippines, for work in the Middle East. The country is fighting illegal ads aiding human traffickers. (© Aaron Favila/AP)

 

Since 2010, every U.S. president has dedicated January as National Human Trafficking Prevention Month, and January 11 is observed as Human Trafficking Awareness Day. (The Department of Homeland Security will host #WearBlueDay on social media on January 11.)

Survivors spare others

Portrait of smiling woman (Courtesy of Tanya Gould)
Tanya Gould (Courtesy of Tanya Gould)

Two survivor leaders spoke with ShareAmerica about protecting young people, in particular.

Tanya Gould, the anti-human trafficking director for the attorney general of Virginia, brings a survivor’s perspective to the state’s response to the problem.

Gould says parents should make “internet guardianship” a priority because traffickers often seek young victims online. “Teach your kids that buying sex is wrong. Everything is not for sale, and the value of sex and intimacy is priceless.”

School staffers should be trained to identify traffickers and minors under their influence, she said. In addition, adults who supervise children should know how to use reporting protocols for suspected trafficking.

Parents and guardians can educate themselves by watching videos of survivors telling their stories and learning about apps that traffickers use to contact young people….

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Joint Statement on Protecting Human Rights Defenders Online

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The text of the following statement is released by the Governments of the United States of America and the European Union in advance of the third U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council Ministerial in Washington, D.C. on December 5, 2022.

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The U.S.-EU partnership is a cornerstone of our shared strength, prosperity, and commitment to advancing freedom, democracy, and respect for human rights around the world.  In the framework of the U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council, we address the misuse of technology threatening security and human rights and have committed to strengthen our cooperation on protecting human rights defenders online; promoting the open, free, global, interoperable, secure, and reliable Internet as stated in the Declaration for the Future of the Internet; combatting online harassment and abuse; eliminating arbitrary and unlawful surveillance; combatting government-imposed Internet shutdowns; and countering disinformation and foreign information manipulation and interference.

Digital technologies are a vital resource for human rights defenders and civic actors around the world, including in the context of documenting human rights violations and abuses, and international humanitarian law violations.  However, these technologies can also be misused to target human rights defenders and undermine civic space.  The United States and the European Union (EU) are deeply concerned by the rapid growth of online threats against human rights defenders and the ongoing contraction of civic space around the world.  Human rights defenders continue to face threats and attacks, including arbitrary or unlawful online surveillance, censorship, harassment, smear campaigns, disinformation to include gendered disinformation, targeted Internet shutdowns, and doxing.  Online attacks often pave the way for physical human rights violations and abuses, including beatings, killings, enforced disappearances, and arbitrary detention.

Women human rights defenders are disproportionately impacted by threats and attacks, which are more often gendered and sexualized than threats against their male counterparts and increasingly take place online.  Many women human rights…

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Radiation emitted from mobile towers has no ill effects on human health: Experts

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Radiation emitted from mobile towers has no ill effects on human health

Radiation emitted from mobile towers has no ill effects on human health (iStock Representative Image)

Photo : iStock

After conducting in-depth tests on 1532 mobile towers, experts on Thursday said that low-powered, non-ionizing radiation emitted from the cell towers has no ill effects on human health. Officials said that the North East Licensed Service Area (NE-LSA) of the Department of Telecommunications has tested 1532 Base Transceiver Stations (BTS) from April to November this year and all the mobile towers have been found compliant as per DoT norms on electric and magnetic fields radiation.

While addressing a webinar on electromagnetic radiations from mobile towers, Dr Tushar Kant Joshi, Advisor, Ministry of Health and Director, OEM Programme, Centre for Occupational and Environmental Health, assured that “it has been found that low powered, non-ionizing radiation emitted from cell towers have no ill effects on human health”

Referring to the scientific research, Joshi said that it becomes extremely essential to address the spread of misinformation and provide an authentic view of health concerns related to mobile towers. It is also important to be informed that no scientific or medical evidence is available to corroborate the argument used against mobile towers, he pointed out.

Shillong-based Senior Deputy Director General of the North-East LSA Ravi Goel highlighted the need for telecom services in India and pressed on the challenges faced by the stakeholders of the industry.

“We are venturing into an age of hyper-connectivity where the government is making every effort to densify telecom infrastructure and telecom towers as these are the backbone of Indian mobile communications.

“In order to magnify the efforts, it is important that the fear surrounding the theories about ill effects of EMF radiations from mobile towers are addressed factually to dispel such misconceptions,” Goel stated.

Deputy Director General of North-East LSA (Compliance) A.K.Jain said that the government has adopted one of the most stringent emission standards for mobile towers in the world. He said: “We follow norms that are 10 times stricter than what has been prescribed by ICNIRP and recommended by WHO…

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