MoMacis - Mathematical models in network security against emergent cyber-threats

Introduction

The main goal of this research project is to design mathematical models to simulate malware and APT spreading. The novelty is based on the use of tools and techniques based of the graph theory and complex network analysis in the design of the models.

Roughly speaking, we try to:

1. Propose new global models (based on systems of ordinary differential equations) to study of the malware and APTs propagation whose compartments are determined by means of different centrality measures.
2. Desing new individual models (based on cellular automata and agents) to simulate malware and APTs spreading taking into account the centrality measures as individual characteristics of the devices.
3. Introduce new centrality measures, to classify secute topological network structures and to develop tools to perform an efficient analysis of the confidential data flow in all kinds of networks.

Who is the project designed for?

This is a basic research project.

How will your project benefit the end-user?

Nowadays it is necessary that companies and public agencies have implemented processes and controls in the corresponding Security Operation Center (SOC) with the aim to detect, respond and mitigate cybersecurity affairs. Among these applications, we believe to be of interest to have malware spreading simulators that allow us to simulate malware and APTs behavior and to check the effectiveness of security countermeasures. On the other hand, it is also interesting to desing tools that allow us to manage (in an efficient way) the confidential information flow in all types of networks. Moreover, it is very important to classify the network topologies with better security characteristics. All these applications are based on the mathematical models designed in this project.