CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Sept. 30, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Akamai
Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: AKAM), the leading provider of cloud
services for delivering, optimizing and securing online content and
business applications, today released its Second Quarter, 2014
State of the Internet Report. Based on data gathered from the
Akamai Intelligent Platform™, the report provides insight into key
global statistics such as connection speeds and broadband adoption
across fixed and mobile networks, overall attack traffic, global 4K
readiness, IPv4 exhaustion and IPv6 implementation, and traffic
patterns across leading Web properties and digital media
providers.
The report also includes insight into the OpenSSL "Heartbleed"
vulnerability, SNMP Reflection Attacks, and Storm and Zeus
crimeware.
Data and graphics from the Second Quarter, 2014 State of the
Internet Report can be found on the Akamai State of the
Internet site and through the Akamai State of the Internet app for
iPads and iPhones.
"The number of 'firsts' we're seeing in the Second Quarter,
2014 State of the Internet Report make this a particularly
interesting quarter," commented David
Belson, editor of the report. "We've experienced our first
quarterly decrease in global unique IP address counts, the global
average connection speed has risen above the 4 Mbps 'broadband'
threshold, and Akamai's customers experienced a reduction in the
likelihood of repeat DDoS attacks."
Highlights from Akamai's Second Quarter, 2014 State of the
Internet Report:
Global Average Connection Speeds and Global Broadband
Connectivity
The global average connection speed increased
21% from the first to second quarter of the year. At 4.6 Mbps, the
global average connection speed exceeded the 4 Mbps "broadband"
threshold for the first time.
Eight of the top 10 countries/regions saw double-digit
percentage increases from the first to the second quarter of 2014,
though South Korea kept its first
place average connection speed (24.6 Mbps) with only a 4% quarterly
increase. Impressive 18% quarterly growth for Hong Kong (15.7 Mbps) pushed it ahead of
Japan, which now matches
Switzerland with an average
connection speed of 14.9 Mbps. Four of the top 10 countries
experienced year-over-year increases of more than 50% in average
connection speeds, led by South
Korea's 84% annual rise. Yearly increases were seen in 136
qualifying countries/regions, from 197% in Uruguay (5.6 Mbps) to 1.2% in the United Arab Emirates (4.6 Mbps).
The global average peak connection speed also saw a significant
uptick, with a 20% increase to 25.4 Mbps from the first quarter to
the second quarter of 2014. All but one of the 139 qualifying
countries/regions experienced average peak connection speed
increases this quarter, ranging from 2.3% in Iraq (30.4 Mbps) to 65% in Jersey (43.2 Mbps).
This is a significant improvement from the first quarter of 2014,
when 92 qualifying countries/regions saw quarterly declines in
their average peak connection speeds. Year over year, the global
average peak connection speed was up by 34%. A total of 125
countries/regions experienced increases over the year, from 0.1% in
Lebanon (4.2 Mbps) to 225% in
Uruguay (49.7 Mbps).
The global high broadband (>10 Mbps) adoption rate continued
to see strong growth in the second quarter of 2014, reaching 23%
thanks to a 12% increase during the quarter. Six of the top 10
countries/regions had more than half of their connections to Akamai
at speeds of 10 Mbps or above in the second quarter, whereas only
two of the top 10 reached that level during the first quarter.
Israel saw the most growth in the
second quarter as compared to the prior quarter, with a 67%
improvement, and while Japan saw
the only decline with a nominal 0.3% decrease, it remained third on
the list, with 54% of its connections at or above 10 Mbps.
South Korea and Switzerland lead the pack with 78% and 56%
adoption rates, respectively. Year over year, the global high
broadband adoption rate was again up by 65%, the same as the first
quarter of 2014. Romania and
Israel boasted impressive yearly
increases of 200% and 156%, respectively.
The global broadband (>4 Mbps) adoption rate grew 5.6%
quarter-over-quarter to reach 59%. Both South Korea and Bulgaria reached 95% broadband adoption in the
second quarter, and five other countries/regions had adoption rates
of 90% or more. Quarter-over-quarter increases were seen in all but
two of the 94 countries/regions that qualified for inclusion.
Growth ranged from just 0.3% in Japan (86% adoption) to 1,263% in Algeria (3% adoption). Year over year, the
global broadband adoption rate increased 18%, with only the
Bahamas and Morocco experiencing drops in adoption. The
Bahamas (71% adoption) lost 0.1%
and Morocco (9.9% adoption) lost
16%.
4K Readiness
Following the introduction of "4K
Readiness" in the First Quarter, 2014 State of the Internet
Report, Akamai has again identified candidate geographies that
are most likely to sustain connection speeds above 15 Mbps, as
Ultra HD adaptive bitrate streams typically require bandwidth
between 10 and 20 Mbps. The findings do not account for other
"readiness" factors, including availability of 4K-encoded content
or 4K-capable televisions and media players.
In total, 51 countries/regions qualified for inclusion this
quarter, and 12% of connections globally were at or above the 15
Mbps threshold. This is up 17% over last quarter's 11% readiness
rate. South Korea, Hong Kong and Japan topped the list, at 62%, 34% and 33%,
respectively. Year over year, the global 4K readiness rate nearly
doubled, growing by 98% to 12% of all connections at 15 Mbps or
above.
Attack Traffic and Security
Akamai maintains a
distributed set of unadvertised agents deployed across the Internet
to log connection attempts that the company classifies as attack
traffic. Based on the data collected by these agents, Akamai is
able to identify the top countries from which attack traffic
originates, as well as the top ports targeted by these attacks. It
is important to note, however, that the originating country as
identified by the source IP address may not represent the nation in
which an attacker resides.
In the second quarter of 2014, Akamai observed attack traffic
originating from 161 unique countries/regions, which was 33 fewer
than the first quarter of the year. According to Akamai's
observations, the highest concentration of attacks (43%) came from
China. Observed traffic from
second-place Indonesia more than
doubled quarter over quarter to reach 15%, while the United States followed with 13%, up
slightly from last quarter's 11%. The composition of the top 10
countries/regions remained the same from quarter to quarter, but
the group was responsible for a greater portion of observed attack
traffic: 84% as opposed to 75% last quarter. Furthermore, 70% of
attack traffic originated from the Asia
Pacific region, while the lowest volume of 0.3% was observed
to originate from Africa.
Attack traffic concentration across the top 10 targeted ports
increased quarter-over-quarter to 71% from 55%. For only the third
time in the history of the report, Port 445 (Microsoft-DS) fell to
the second-most targeted by attackers. Port 80 (WWW/HTTP) took the
lead in the second quarter when its attack traffic nearly doubled
to 15% but, interestingly, was not the most targeted port among any
of the top 10 countries/regions.
Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) Attack Traffic
In
addition to observations on attack traffic, the State of the
Internet Report includes insight into DDoS attacks based on
reports from Akamai's customers. Akamai customers reported 270 DDoS
attacks in the second quarter, down from 283 in the first quarter,
marking the second consecutive quarter with a decline and a drop of
15% year over year. This trend supports assertions from the
Prolexic Q2 Global DDoS Attack Report, suggesting that
volumetric attacks targeting Layers 1-4 have increased while
application attacks targeting Layers 5-7 have declined.
Though the global number of DDoS attacks is down, the Americas
showed an 11% increase in the number of attacks, claiming 57% of
all reported attacks. Meanwhile, Asia
Pacific has experienced the largest decline in reported DDoS
attacks quarter over quarter, dropping 23% from the first quarter
to the second, accounting for 25% of worldwide reported DDoS
attacks. Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) remained in third place with a
modest decline of 14%, amounting to 18% of all reported DDoS
attacks. In the second quarter, attacks against the high tech
sector continued an upward trend with a 60% increase, whereas the
public sector saw the biggest decline (54%).
For the first time since Akamai began tracking repeated attacks
against targets, the number of customers that saw subsequent
attacks declined from one in four (26%) to nearly one in six (18%).
Only two customers were targeted by DDoS attacks more than five
times, with one customer seeing as many as seven total attacks, as
opposed to the high of 17 attacks the previous quarter.
IPv4 and IPv6
In the second quarter of 2014, more than
788 million IPv4 addresses connected to the Akamai Intelligent
Platform from more than 238 unique countries/regions. For the first
time in the history of the State of the Internet Report, the
global unique IP address count declined quarter over quarter, by a
nominal 0.9%; however, this was 4.8% more than the same time last
year. While only two of the top 10 countries/regions (Brazil and Japan) saw IP address counts increase from the
first quarter, 46% of all countries experienced
quarter-over-quarter increases in unique IPv4 address counts, with
26 countries/regions growing by 10% or more.
"Though even a minimal quarter-to-quarter decline is unusual in
the history of this report, we see no reason for concern," said
Belson. "It may be due to providers working to conserve limited
IPv4 address space, or likely was a result of increased IPv6
connectivity and adoption among leading network providers. That
said, globally, 69% of countries and regions still showed
year-over-year increases in unique IPv4 address counts."
As for IPv6 adoption, the largest number of requests continued
to come from cable and mobile providers, led by Verizon Wireless,
with 50% of its requests to Akamai coming over IPv6. Four other
providers, Telenet, Brutele, Kabel Deutschland and XS4ALL had more
than one-third of their requests take place over IPv6. European
countries continued to dominate the IPv6 adoption list, holding
seven of the top 10 positions.
Mobile Connectivity
In the Second Quarter, 2014
State of the Internet Report, 56 countries/regions qualified
for inclusion in the mobile section. South Korea's average mobile connection speed
grew slightly from 14.7 Mbps to 15.2 Mbps to maintain its top
position, while Vietnam hit a
global low of 0.9 Mbps. Average peak mobile connection speeds among
qualifying countries/regions ranged from 108 Mbps in Australia down to 4.7 Mbps in Vietnam.
The report also examines the percentage of connections to Akamai
from mobile network providers at "broadband" speeds (more than 4
Mbps). In the second quarter, Denmark reported the highest level of mobile
broadband adoption at 92%, whereas Brazil, Croatia, Paraguay, Vietnam and Bolivia all had mobile broadband adoption
rates below 1%.
About the Akamai State of the Internet
Report
Each quarter, Akamai publishes a "State of the
Internet" report. This report includes data gathered from across
the Akamai Intelligent Platform about attack traffic, broadband
adoption, mobile connectivity and other relevant topics concerning
the Internet and its usage, as well as trends seen in this data
over time. To learn more and to access the archive of past reports,
please visit www.akamai.com/stateoftheinternet. To download the
figures from the Second Quarter, 2014 State of the Internet
Report, please visit:
http://wwwns.akamai.com/soti/soti_q214_figures.zip.
About Akamai
Akamai® is the leading
provider of cloud services for delivering, optimizing and securing
online content and business applications. At the core of the
Company's solutions is the Akamai Intelligent Platform™ providing
extensive reach, coupled with first class reliability, security,
visibility and expertise. Akamai removes the complexities of
connecting the increasingly mobile world, supporting 24/7 consumer
demand, and enabling enterprises to securely leverage the cloud. To
learn more about how Akamai is accelerating the pace of innovation
in a hyperconnected world, please visit www.akamai.com or
blogs.akamai.com, and follow @Akamai on Twitter.
Contacts:
|
|
Chris
Nicholson
|
Tom Barth
|
Media
Relations
|
Investor
Relations
|
617-444-2987
|
617-274-7130
|
cnichols@akamai.com
|
tbarth@akamai.com
|
Logo -
http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20100225/AKAMAILOGO
SOURCE Akamai Technologies, Inc.