A new comprehensive dataset of the global cybersecurity threat landscape, spanning 2007 – 2017 is set to help cybersecurity specialists predict future malicious online activity.
Researchers from CSIRO’s Data61 and Macquarie University, in collaboration with Nokia Bell Labs and University of Sydney, have developed the dataset ‘FinalBlacklist’, which is the first and largest publicly available dataset of its kind.
The researchers collected a total of 51.6 million mal-activity reports dating back to 2007 involving 662,000 unique IP addresses worldwide, which were categorised using machine learning techniques into six classes of mal-activity: Malware, Phishing, Fraudulent Services, Potentially Unwanted Programs, Exploits and Spamming.
Professor Dali Kaafar, Information Security and Privacy research leader at CSIRO’s Data61 and Scientific Director of Optus Macquarie University Cyber Security Hub, said that malicious software (or malware) has consistently been the weapon of choice for cyber-criminals over the past decade.
Last year the WannaCry ransomware attack affected more than 300,000 computers across 150 countries causing billions of dollars in damage.
“Ransomware remains a persistent threat as evidenced by the recent attacks against hospitals across Victoria,” Professor Kaafar said.
Reports of phishing activities have also steadily risen with a spike in 2009 coinciding with the increased adoption of smartphones.
In 2013, another spike was experienced which can be linked to the growing popularity of digital payment systems which attracted unwanted attention from cybercriminals.
Analysis of the retrospective dataset will allow researchers to identify how the sources, types and scale of different mal-activity has transformed over time, so that organisations can be better prepared against it.
“We’ve made this dataset available to the wider research community so it can be used to train algorithms to predict future instances of mal-activity before they happen,” Professor Kaafar said.
The dataset shows that mal-activity has consistently increased in volume over the last decade. In fact, the annual cost of cybercrime damages is expected to hit $6 trillion by 2021.
Dr Liming Zhu, Software and Computational Systems Research Director at CSIRO’s Data61 said researchers and organisations are locked in a perpetual arms race to combat widespread malicious activity on the Internet.
“The insights that can be drawn from the FinalBlacklist dataset represent a significant contribution to cybersecurity research.
“A retrospective analysis of historical mal-activity trends could help reduce the impact of cybercrime on the economy,” Dr Zhu said.
Although other longitudinal datasets do exist, they are predominantly proprietary as industries are unable to share them due to privacy concerns and wanting to maintain a competitive advantage.
“Our analysis revealed a consistent minority of repeat offenders that contributed a majority of the mal-activity reports. Detecting and quickly reacting to the emergence of these mal-activity contributors could significantly reduce the damage inflicted,” Professor Kaafar said.
Tips to avoid malicious online activity:
- Keep your operating system (OS) current: Whether you’re running Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, or any other OS, keep it up to date. OS developers regularly issue security patches that fix and plug security leaks.
- Don’t give in to ransom demands: If your device is infected by ransomware and you are locked out from accessing your files, don’t pay the ransom. There are no guarantees that your files will be released when you are dealing with criminals.
- Think before you click: Do not click on a link in an unsolicited email or open email attachments from somebody that you do not know. Hover over the link to check its validity.
- Do not reuse passwords: Use unique passwords for all online accounts. Randomly mix up symbols and numbers with letters. The longer and more complex your password, the more effective it will be in preventing brute-force attacks.
- Install ad blockers: Ads can be used to serve up malware or malvertising (malicious advertising containing viruses) and these simple web extensions can prevent this.
- Install script blockers (JavaScript-blockers in particular): Privacy preserving tools like NoScript preemptively block malicious scripts and only allow JavaScript, Java and other content from trusted sites.
