Spike In Direct traffic

[DavP72]

Just looking at Google Analytics for an e-commerce client. There was an unusually large spike in Direct traffic around the 17th February. The hits originate on a network domain called amazonaws.com

A search shows that this is Amazon Cloud Service. The bounce rate is 100% so I suspect it could be a spam bot.

Does anyone know how to block spam bots in reports?

 

[sambarnes90]

Looks like someone has had your exact problem and written pretty extensively about it:
WHAT TO DO ABOUT A FAKE BS SURGE OF GOOGLE ANALYTICS VISITS

My initial thought was to add a filter to your profile to prevent these being tracked in analytics.

But the post also highlights using advanced segments, which would be another possibility.

 

[DavP72]

That's great. The advanced segments sounds like a good idea. Thanks for that link - definitely one to bookmark

These pesky spam bots seem to be showing up in GA a lot more frequently recently.