His 1987 doctoral dissertation was on the subject of computer viruses. Fred Cohen experimented with computer viruses and confirmed Neumann's postulate and investigated other properties of malware such as detectability and self-obfuscation using rudimentary encryption. This constituted a plausibility result in computability theory. John von Neumann showed that in theory a program could reproduce itself.

The notion of a self-reproducing computer program can be traced back to initial theories about the operation of complex automata. History įor a chronological guide, see Timeline of computer viruses and worms. Malware is now being designed to evade antivirus software detection algorithms.

The defense strategies against malware differ according to the type of malware but most can be thwarted by installing antivirus software, firewalls, applying regular patches to reduce zero-day attacks, securing networks from intrusion, having regular backups and isolating infected systems. Since 2021, malware has been designed to target computer systems that run critical infrastructure such as the electricity distribution network. Cybercrime, which includes malware attacks as well as other crimes committed by computer, was predicted to cost the world economy $6 trillion USD in 2021, and is increasing at a rate of 15% per year. According to Symantec's 2018 Internet Security Threat Report (ISTR), malware variants number has increased to 669,947,865 in 2017, which is twice as many malware variants as in 2016. Malware poses serious problems to individuals and businesses on the Internet. computer viruses, worms, Trojan horses, ransomware, spyware, adware, rogue software, wiper and keyloggers).

Researchers tend to classify malware into one or more sub-types (i.e.

Malware (a portmanteau for malicious software) is any software intentionally designed to cause disruption to a computer, server, client, or computer network, leak private information, gain unauthorized access to information or systems, deprive access to information, or which unknowingly interferes with the user's computer security and privacy.

Security information and event management (SIEM).

Host-based intrusion detection system (HIDS).

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