Searching for Web service access points is no longer attached to
service registries as Web search engines have become a new
major source for discovering Web services. In this work, we
conduct a thorough analytical investigation on the plurality of
Web service interfaces that exist on the Web today. Using our
Web Service Crawler Engine (WSCE), we collect metadata
service information on retrieved interfaces through accessible
UBRs, service portals and search engines. We use this data to
determine Web service statistics and distribution based on object
sizes, types of technologies employed, and the number of
functioning services. This statistical data can be used to help
determine the current status of Web services. We determine an
intriguing result that 63% of the available Web services on the
Web are considered to be active. We further use our findings to
provide insights on improving the service retrieval process.