Skip to main content

A Malware Classification Method Based on the Capsule Network

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Machine Learning for Cyber Security (ML4CS 2020)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNSC,volume 12486))

Included in the following conference series:

Abstract

Malware has become a serious threat to network security. Traditional static analysis methods usually cannot effectively detect packers, obfuscations, and variants. Dynamic analysis is not efficient when dealing with large amounts of malware. Aiming at the shortcomings of the existing methods, this paper proposes a method for analyzing malware based on the capsule network. It uses a supervised learning method to train the capsule network with a large number of malware samples with existing category labels. In the process of constructing features, this paper adopts a method of combining static features and dynamic features to extract the operation code information based on static analysis, and extract the API call sequence information based on general analysis. Both characteristics can well represent the structure and behavior of malware. Then use N-Gram to construct sequence features, visualize the N-Gram sequence, generate malware images, and finally use the capsule network for classification detection. In addition, this paper improves the original capsule network and verifies the effect of the improved model.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 84.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  1. Yann, Y.B., Geoffrey, H.: Deep learning. Nature 521(4), 436–444 (2015)

    Google Scholar 

  2. Shin, H.C., et al.: Deep convolutional neural networks for computer-aided detection: CNN architectures, dataset characteristics and transfer learning. IEEE Trans. Med. Imaging 35(5), 1 (2016)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Nikitha, R., Vedhapriyavadhana, R., Anubala, V.P.: Video saliency detection using weight based spatio-temporal features. In: 2018 International Conference on Smart Systems and Inventive Technology (ICSSIT), Tirunelveli, pp. 343–347. IEEE (2018)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Han, W., Xue, J., Wang, Y., Zhu, S., Kong, Z.: Review: build a roadmap for stepping into the field of anti-malware research smoothly. IEEE Access 7, 143573–143596 (2019)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Liu, L., et al.: A static tagging method of malicious code family based on multi-feature. J. Inf. Secur. Res. 4(4), 322–328 (2018)

    Google Scholar 

  6. Song, Y., et al.: Structure and properties of shapememory polyurethane block copolymers. Mach. Learn. 81(2), 179–205 (2017)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Merkel, R., Hoppe, T., Kraetzer, C., Dittmann, J.: Statistical detection of malicious PE-executables for fast offline analysis. In: De Decker, B., Schaumüller-Bichl, I. (eds.) CMS 2010. LNCS, vol. 6109, pp. 93–105. Springer, Heidelberg (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-13241-4_10

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  8. Martin, J., Lórencz, R.: Malware detection using a heterogeneous distance function. Comput. Inform. 37(3), 759–780 (2018)

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  9. Han, W., et al.: MalInsight: a systematic profiling based malware detection framework. J. Netw. Comput. Appl. 125(1), 236–250 (2019)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Wang, W., et al.: Detecting Android malicious apps and categorizing benign apps with ensemble of classifiers. Future Gener. Comput. Syst. 78(3), 987–994 (2018)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Han, W., et al.: MalDAE: detecting and explaining malware based on correlation and fusion of static and dynamic characteristics. Comput. Secur. 83, 208–233 (2019)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Ye, Y., et al.: An intelligent PE-malware detection system based on association mining. J. Comput. Virol. 4, 323–334 (2008)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Imran, M., Afzal, M.T., Qadir, M.A.: Using hidden markov model for dynamic malware analysis: first impressions. In: International Conference on Fuzzy Systems and Knowledge Discovery, Zhangjiajie, pp. 816–821. IEEE (2016)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Tan, L.N., et al.: Dynamic time warping and sparse representation classification for birdsong phrase classification using limited training data. J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 173(3), 1069–1080 (2015)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Ding, J., et al.: MGeT: malware gene-based malware dynamic analyses. In: Proceedings of the 2017 International Conference on Cryptography, Security and Privacy, Wuhan, pp. 96–101. ACM (2017)

    Google Scholar 

  16. Stokes, J.W., et al.: Detection of prevalent malware families with deep learning. In: 2019 IEEE Military Communications Conference (MILCOM), Norfolk, pp. 1–8, IEEE (2019)

    Google Scholar 

  17. Park, S., et al.: Generative malware outbreak detection. In: 2019 IEEE International Conference on Industrial Technology (ICIT), Melbourne, pp. 1149–1154. IEEE (2019)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Meng, X., et al.: MCSMGS: malware classification model based on deep learning. In: 2017 International Conference on Cyber-Enabled Distributed Computing and Knowledge Discovery (CyberC), Nanjing, pp. 272–275. IEEE (2017)

    Google Scholar 

  19. Sewak, M., et al.: Comparison of deep learning and the classical machine learning algorithm for the malware detection. In: 19th IEEE/ACIS International Conference on Software Engineering, Artificial Intelligence, Networking and Parallel/Distributed Computing (SNPD), Busan, pp. 293–296. IEEE (2018)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China under Grant 2016QY06X1205.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Weijie Han .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this paper

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this paper

Wang, Z., Han, W., Lu, Y., Xue, J. (2020). A Malware Classification Method Based on the Capsule Network. In: Chen, X., Yan, H., Yan, Q., Zhang, X. (eds) Machine Learning for Cyber Security. ML4CS 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12486. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62223-7_4

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62223-7_4

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-62222-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-62223-7

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics