Shahid Alam
University of Victoria
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Publication
Featured researches published by Shahid Alam.
Computers & Security | 2015
Shahid Alam; R. Nigel Horspool; Issa Traore; Ibrahim Sogukpinar
Because of the financial and other gains attached with the growing malware industry, there is a need to automate the process of malware analysis and provide real-time malware detection. To hide a malware, obfuscation techniques are used. One such technique is metamorphism encoding that mutates the dynamic binary code and changes the opcode with every run to avoid detection. This makes malware difficult to detect in real-time and generally requires a behavioral signature for detection. In this paper we present a new framework called MARD for Metamorphic Malware Analysis and Real-Time Detection, to protect the end points that are often the last defense, against metamorphic malware. MARD provides: (1) automation (2) platform independence (3) optimizations for real-time performance and (4) modularity. We also present a comparison of MARD with other such recent efforts. Experimental evaluation of MARD achieves a detection rate of 99.6% and a false positive rate of 4%.
security of information and networks | 2013
Shahid Alam; R. Nigel Horspool; Issa Traore
Dynamic binary obfuscation or metamorphism is a technique where a malware never keeps the same sequence of opcodes in the memory. Such malware are very difficult to analyse and detect manually even with the help of tools. We need to automate the analysis and detection process of such malware. This paper introduces and presents a new language named MAIL (Malware Analysis Intermediate Language) to automate and optimize this process. MAIL also provides portability for building malware analysis and detection tools. Each MAIL statement is assigned a pattern that can be used to annotate a control flow graph for pattern matching to analyse and detect metamorphic malware. Experimental evaluation of the proposed approach using an existing dataset yields malware detection rate of 93.92% and false positive rate of 3.02%.
advanced information networking and applications | 2014
Shahid Alam; R. Nigel Horspool; Issa Traore
Because of the financial and other gains attached with the growing malware industry, there is a need to automate the process of malware analysis and provide real-time malware detection. To hide a malware, obfuscation techniques are used. One such technique is metamorphism encoding that mutates the dynamic binary code and changes the opcode with every run to avoid detection. This makes malware difficult to detect in real-time and generally requires a behavioral signature for detection. In this paper we present a new framework called MARD for Metamorphic Malware Analysis and Real-Time Detection, to protect the end points that are often the last defense, against metamorphic malware. MARD provides: (1) automation (2) platform independence (3) optimizations for real-time performance and (4) modularity. We also present a comparison of MARD with other such recent efforts. Experimental evaluation of MARD achieves a detection rate of 99.6% and a false positive rate of 4%.
The Computer Journal | 2015
Shahid Alam; Issa Traore; Ibrahim Sogukpinar
Metamorphism is a technique that mutates the binary code using different obfuscations and never keeps the same sequence of opcodes in the memory. This stealth technique provides the capability to a malware for evading detection by simple signature-based (such as instruction sequences, byte sequences and string signatures) anti-malware programs. In this paper, we present a new scheme named Annotated Control Flow Graph (ACFG) to efficiently detect such kinds of malware. ACFG is built by annotating CFG of a binary program and is used for graph and pattern matching to analyse and detect metamorphic malware. We also optimize the runtime of malware detection through parallelization and ACFG reduction, maintaining the same accuracy (without ACFG reduction) for malware detection. ACFG proposed in this paper: (i) captures the control flow semantics of a program; (ii) provides a faster matching of ACFGs and can handle malware with smaller CFGs, compared with other such techniques, without compromising the accuracy; (iii) contains more information and hence provides more accuracy than a CFG. Experimental evaluation of the proposed scheme using an existing dataset yields malware detection rate of 98.9% and false positive rate of 4.5%.
security of information and networks | 2014
Shahid Alam; Ibrahim Sogukpinar; Issa Traore; Yvonne Coady
With the advent of Internet of Things, we are facing another wave of malware attacks, that encompass intelligent embedded devices. Because of the limited energy resources, running a complete malware detector on these devices is quite challenging. There is a need to devise new techniques to detect malware on these devices. Malware detection is one of the services that can be provided as an in-cloud service. This paper reviews current such systems, discusses there pros and cons, and recommends an improved in-cloud malware analysis and detection system. We introduce a new three layered hybrid system with a lightweight antimalware engine. These features can provide faster malware detection response time, shield the client from malware and reduce the bandwidth between the client and the cloud, compared to other such systems. The paper serves as a motivation for improving the current and developing new techniques for in-cloud malware analysis and detection system.
security of information and networks | 2014
Shahid Alam; Issa Traore; Ibrahim Sogukpinar
Dynamic binary obfuscation or metamorphism is a technique where a malware never keeps the same sequence of opcodes in the memory. This stealthy mutation technique helps a malware evade detection by todays signature-based anti-malware programs. This paper analyzes the current trends, provides future directions and reasons about some of the basic characteristics of a system for providing real-time detection of metamorphic malware. Our emphasis is on the most recent advancements and the potentials available in metamorphic malware detection, so we only cover some of the major academic research efforts carried out, including and after, the year 2006. The paper not only serves as a collection of recent references and information for easy comparison and analysis, but also as a motivation for improving the current and developing new techniques for metamorphic malware detection.
ieee international conference semantic computing | 2017
Yukiko Sasaki Alam; Shahid Alam
This paper aims to find out what knowledge is needed to improve the quality of syntactic and semantic parsing by manually examining and analyzing individual machine translation output errors that involve syntax.
Journal of Computer Virology and Hacking Techniques | 2015
Shahid Alam; Ibrahim Sogukpinar; Issa Traore; R. Nigel Horspool
International Journal of Engineering Pedagogy (iJEP) | 2013
Shahid Alam; LillAnne Jackson
Computing and Informatics \/ Computers and Artificial Intelligence | 2016
Shahid Alam; R. Nigel Horspool