News Feature | July 15, 2014

"State Of The Internet Report" Provides Insights For VARs

By Cheryl Knight, contributing writer

State Of The Internet Report

Akamai’s State of the Internet Report for Q1 2014 reveals insights on various trends related to the Internet, including efforts to stop distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks and an assessment of connection speed and mobile connectivity. To download the report, visit http://www.akamai.com/stateoftheinternet/.

Information for the report was gathered using the cloud services provider’s Akamai Intelligent Platform, which delivers more than 2 trillion Internet interactions and defends against multiple DDoS attacks each day. Utilizing this information, the report outlines online trends, including:

  • Levels of readiness for streaming 4K video in countries around the world
  • Country-level mobile connection speeds and broadband adoption rates
  • Network providers and countries with the highest levels of IPv6 adoption

DDoS Attacks

The report reveals a 20 percent decline in DDoS attacks from Q4 2013 to Q1 2014. DDoS attacks, however, still saw an overall increase of 27 percent compared to Q1 2013. According to the report, most regions around the world saw a decline in the number of DDoS attacks, though the U.S. still accounted for roughly 49 percent of such attacks.

By industry, the enterprise sector saw the biggest decrease in attacks — down 49 percent — from the last quarter of 2013 to the first quarter of 2014, but the sector still had a 11 percent increase in attacks from the first quarter of the previous year.

Akamai began to look at the probability of repeated attacks on the same target in Q3 2014, and observed the chances of repeat attacks are about one in four in the same quarter and one in three in the same year. Of the 164 organizations that faced DDoS attacks in Q1 2014, 26 percent faced repeat attacks, five were targeted more than five times, and one organization suffered 17 distinct attacks.  

Internet Connection Speeds

According to Tech Times, while the report stated that the average Internet connection speed rose on a worldwide level by 1.8 percent, average peak connection speeds saw a decline of 8.6 percent in Q1 2014. Despite this, on a yearly scale, Internet connection speeds have seen a 13 percent increase over a period of years.

The report’s editor, David Belson, says in a press release, “While there continues to be room for improvement in high broadband adoption and average peak connection speeds in some areas of the world, the trends we’re seeing remain very positive.”

Mobile Connectivity

The report includes data from telecommunications equipment and services provider Ericsson. Data shows the volume of mobile data traffic grew about 15 percent from Q4 2013 and Q1 2014, and that data traffic has shown a strong increase since 2009. Voice traffic, however has been flat over the same timeframe.

The full report offers global data and trends, Internet penetration, situational performance, and Internet disruptions and events.