Malware analysis - 'video write-up' of one of the ECSC 2021 challenges

Jan Kopriva — Tue, 21 Jun 2022 08:25:00 +0100

I published a new video on the Untrusted Network YouTube channel today, which shows one possible solution for a “malware analysis task” which I prepared for the final round of last year’s European Cyber Security Challenge. If you would like to take a closer look at the multi-stage “malware” which contestants in the ECSC 2021 had to analyze, or if you would like to try to analyze the sample yourself, now you have a chance to do so - you will find further information in the following video.

The video is also available in a Czech language version.

History of Malware - Episode 1: Origins of Malware (1948 - 1979)

Jan Kopriva — Mon, 11 May 2020 09:35:00 +0200

I decided to start a YouTube series on the History of Malware and the first video was published today.

In this episode we’ll take a look at where malware began. We’ll discuss the first theoretical works by John von Neumann, the origins of the terms ‘virus’ and ‘worm’ in relation to malware and the early experiments in distributed computation that gave birth to the first computer worms. If you’d like to learn more about the subjects, you may find links for the relevant sources under the video.

John von Neumann - The General and Logical Theory of Automata
http://physics.bu.edu/~pankajm/PY571/HixonsymposiumVonNeumaan.pdf

John von Neumann - Theory of Self-Reproducing Automata
http://www.arise.mae.usp.br/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Theory-of-self-reproducing-automata.pdf
https://archive.org/details/theoryofselfrepr00vonn_0/mode/2up

Lionel Penrose - Self-Reproducing Machines
http://fab.cba.mit.edu/classes/865.18/replication/Penrose.pdf
https://wellcomelibrary.org/item/b20219222

Frederick G. Stahl - 1960 – the first artificial universe complex artificial life in a Darwinian world
http://archive.computerhistory.org/resources/access/text/2017/02/102724826-05-01-acc.pdf

M. D. McIlroy, R. Morris, V. A. Vyssotsky - Letter to C. A. Lang about Darwin
https://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~doug/darwin.pdf

The Jargon File 4.2.2
https://vanderworp.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/jargon.pdf

Fork bombs - Wikia
https://malware.wikia.org/wiki/Fork_Bomb

Numberphile - Does John Conway hate his Game of Life?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8kUJL04ELA

Gregory Benford - The Scared Man
http://www.gregorybenford.com/extra/the-scarred-man-returns/

Jordan Spencer Cunningham - Q&A with Ray Tomlinson on Creeper “Virus”
https://nerdology.org/2014/11/qa-with-ray-tomlinson-on-creeper/

Veith Risak - Selbstreproduzierende Automaten mit minimaler Informationsübertragung
https://web.archive.org/web/20080305093506/http://www.cosy.sbg.ac.at/~risak/bilder/selbstrep.html

Cicatrix - Interview with Q The Misanthrope
http://web.archive.org/web/20080406223546/http:/vx.netlux.org/lib/static/vdat/ivqmisan.htm

Peter G. Neumann - The Risk Digest Volume 6 Issue 53
http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/6.53.html#subj4

John Walker - The Animal Episode
https://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/univac/animal.html

PARC History
https://web.archive.org/web/20070711093550/http://www.parc.xerox.com/about/history/default.html

John F. Shoch and Jon A. Hupp - The "Worm" Programs Early Experience with a Distributed Computation
http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.137.9511&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Video on Untrusted Network

Malware analysis - 'video write-up' of one of the ECSC 2021 challenges

History of Malware - Episode 1: Origins of Malware (1948 - 1979)