Roughly the size of a human hand, Joro spiders have increasingly been spreading throughout the eastern seaboard of the United States.

With the females capable of growing as large as eight inches across, and males four inches, the Joro spiders can be an intimidating sight.

But despite their capacity to frighten visually, the arachnids should "not really [be] much of a concern," said Daniel Kronauer of Rockefeller University. "They're not dangerous. They're not aggressive…They're not venomous in a sense that they're dangerous to humans."

Originally hailing from East Asia, the species derives its name from Japanese lore; the mythical creature Jorogumo is able to trap men with silk.

The Joro was first spotted in the United States in Georgia a decade ago.

"Since then they have been expanding every year," Kronauer went on, nothing their spread throughout the Carolinas, Virginia and Maryland. "In the native range, they, they occur in Japan, China, but up to the foothills of the Himalayas. So they're pretty cold tolerant. And I think that's why we can expect them to move further north."

And their journey to the US was probably the result of human commerce.

"So most of these invasive species get spread around by humans, often in cargo… that's carried by ships as ballast."

And they may even act to help trap unwanted bugs like mosquitoes, experts note.

"There's a good chance that maybe this summer we'll see some of them in New York," Kronauer said.

(Production by: Dan Fastenberg)