Increasingly advanced DDoS attacks ramp up amid mounting API, AI targeting

SecurityWeek reports that distributed denial-of-service attacks have increased in volume and scale amid the increasing prevalence of API intrusions and AI abuse.

More advanced Layer 7 DDoS intrusions that target APIs and web apps have risen by 104% during the past three years, findings from Akamai's State of the Internet Report showed. While the acceleration of Layer 3 and Layer 4 attacks that impact network and transport layers has been slower over the same period, such DDoS incidents have attained significant scale, primarily due to the Mirai botnet. Meanwhile, APIs have emerged as one of the leading initial vectors for enterprise environment compromise, with API intrusions found to have expanded the scope of Level 3 and Level 4 DDoS attacks, according to researchers, who noted shadow API issues being amplified by shadow AI usage.

"From an attacker's perspective, for every web application there are APIs that expose functions and (potentially) data. The more vulnerable and easier the apps and APIs are to compromise, the quicker the threat actors can reach their objectives. The rise of AI agents that consume APIs to interact with the real world amplifies the problem," said the report.