<p>Global piracy incidents have posed security risks and caused significant losses in maritime transportation. Understanding their distribution pattern and spatial evolution is crucial in economic geography, geopolitics, and transportation economics. This study employs time series change detection and spatial feature analysis to analyze global piracy incident data from 2006 to 2021. The findings reveal that the overall number of piracy incidents follows a pattern of rise, decline, and stabilization, with structural breakpoints in 2008 and 2012. The spatial progression of piracy incidents moves from Maritime Southeast Asia to the Gulf of Aden and the Western Indian Ocean, and then to the Gulf of Guinea. Continuous hot spots are concentrated along the coasts of key ports in Maritime Southeast Asia, while sporadic hot spots extend from ports to bay areas in the Gulf of Guinea and Maritime Southeast Asia. Economic poverty, complex natural geographical environments, political instability, the presence of key transport corridors, and energy market changes are the main driving forces behind piracy incidents and their distribution patterns. Combining dominant factors, coastline distance, and spatial form, there are different geographic patterns, such as natural shelter, energy-driven, sovereignty deficiency, isolated points, and transport corridor. This research provides scientific guidance for global maritime security decision-making and anti-piracy operations.</p>