New data from Bolster AI featured in Akamai’s latest State of the Internet report shows that online scam activity has overtaken phishing for the first time. Scam detections reached approximately 6.4 million between April and June 2026, up from 3.2 million in the July–September 2025 period, as attackers increasingly turn to fake stores, investment scams, tech support schemes and payment fraud to generate revenue more directly.
Phishing also continued to rise, with detections increasing 61% as reusable kits, industrialized infrastructure and AI make attacks faster and easier to scale. The report found that the average lifespan of a phishing attack fell from 48 days in late 2025 to 22 days by the second quarter of 2026, underscoring how AI is accelerating both fraud creation and attack turnover while pushing security teams toward faster, more automated detection and investigation.