Security: An Algorithm Every Company Needs

Malware and viruses are no longer a conversation of the past; in fact, it has become a national security issue for the U.S. government in fighting daily cyber-attacks. This issue is not just a local IT department issue — it affects the entire world — and hackers are showing us just how vulnerable security is for enterprises and small businesses alike. Think of it this way, it is not a simple Norton Anti-virus solution we spend a little extra on when you buy a PC. 

It has become a serious enough issue that even Swiss scientists have developed an algorithm that is able to detect and locate spammers as well as the route of the computer virus or malware that is spread. This algorithm is able to seek out sources by only checking a small percentage of connections in a network.

“It is literally impossible to be able to track the status of all nodes on the internet, which would need more than a billion sensors”, said Pedro Pinto, post-doctoral researcher at the Audiovisual Communications Laboratory of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL). Pinto and his colleagues developed and tested an algorithm that shows the capability to estimate the location of the malware or virus from measurements collected by sensors.

A specific computer in the network, from where the spam mail is being sent, can be detected and found so that the network provider is easily able to shut it down. It uses a method where the original computer injected with a virus may be directly located and identified. Thus, detecting the location of the source of the malware or virus is achieved by using the network infrastructure, and by looking at who is connected, which allows the infrastructure to establish the time of arrival of the malware or virus to the sensors.

“The algorithm only has to analyze ten to twenty percent of all the nodes in a network to determine what the likely source of an attack is,” Pinto said. “Sometimes this is five percent,” he added, pointing out that the number of nodes that need to be analyzed depends on the complexity of the network.

These type of discoveries can allow companies to use this method for different types of needs, although, it is only to be distributed through security companies. Since the paper was published, Pedro Pinto and his team have been inundated with inquiries.

Find out more about IT security when it comes to Malware and viruses, and investing in and stabilizing your IT infrastructure is a priority for the success of your organization’s future.

Written by IT Management and IT Consulting professionals at FedSolutions.  Thanks for stopping by!