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Sneakers are one of the most popular collectible items. They are also prime targets for scalpers.
Grand View Research values the global sneaker industry at $86 billion and predicts it will reach $128 billion by 2030. The resale market is also doing well, with Cowen Research estimating that he will grow to $30 billion by the end of 2010.
Such popularity makes sneakers easy targets for bots, software applications that can perform specific tasks on behalf of humans. Sneaker bots can also accelerate the checkout process, wait in virtual queues, and enter billing information.
Sneakerbot became popular in 2012 when Nike revealed the Air Jordan Dornbecher 9 shoes on Twitter. Nike required users to message the company directly to reserve the shoes. Subsequently, a bot was created that would send a message to Nike when it found keywords such as ‘Rent now’ and ‘Doernbecher’. The bots were able to react faster than humans, beating customers over their chances of getting the shoes.
Sneakerbots are now big business for the people behind them
“In 2022, I made a gross profit of $131,000,” said sneakerbot developer and YouTube creator “Botterboy Nova.” He uses this pseudonym due to security concerns.
Queue-it CEO Jesper Essendrop agrees. His company specializes in controlling internet his traffic using virtual waiting rooms.
Essendrop said that looking at “sales of high-profile products such as sneakers,” “bots account for between 40% and 95% of all traffic to webshops.”
In 2021, cybersecurity software company Imperva found that about 23% of retail site traffic came from malicious bots. And his CHEQ, another software vendor in the space, found that one of his four 2022 Black Friday shoppers was fake.
Currently, there are no laws prohibiting the use of bots to purchase sneakers or other retail items. However, bills have been introduced, such as a bill drafted by Rep. Paul Tonko of New York called the Stop Grinchbot Act.
“Bots are a nuisance to me,” says Richie Roxas, who collects New Balance sneakers. “I am now constantly competing with them for special releases and collaborations.”
Popular sneaker brands are like this Nike, Adidas and New Balance are under constant attack from bots. According to Nike, the company’s SNKRS app receives an average of 12 billion bot calls per month, or entries that attempt to exploit the system.
The SNKRS app allows customers to enter a drawing by selecting shoes and sizes. Nike will then randomly select participants to purchase the shoes. Many of these customers are actually bots.
According to Nike, bots can account for up to 10% to 50% of entries, depending on demand. For example, in the Travis Scott x Air Jordan 1 Low OG “Olive” released in 2023, nearly half of the entries was a bot. However, Nike told CNBC that it has up to a 98% success rate in fighting bots for high-demand product launches.
Nova and other bot creators haven’t had much success in recent years, but they still find ways to circumvent loopholes and anti-bot measures such as CAPTCHA systems. One workaround is called jigging, where authors slightly change addresses, names, and other identifying information.
“People are still successfully botifying Nike SNKRS,” Nova said. “But to tackle that, you really need to understand how Nike filters work.”
Nike declined to comment on whether customers will continue to be able to successfully use the bot in the SNKRS app.
To learn more about sneaker bots and how companies like Nike are dealing with them, watch the video.