MALCON 2017 - 12th IEEE International Conference on Malicious and Unwanted Software

In keeping with its tradition to bring attention to emerging trends and issues in computer security, MALCON 2017 invites academic research and industry experience papers on the following major themes:
• Evolving Threat Landscape: The Malware Criminal EcoSystem has become a vibrant sector of the dark economy in recent years. Innovation in this ecosystem is rampant at all levels - from the discovery of new vulnerabilities, to the introduction of new deployment mechanisms. This division of labor in the Malware Ecosystem has accelerated the deployment of new threats which often are deployed by multiple entities across platforms (often sloppily), but which certainly meet the business objectives. Current security approaches are often ineffective, since attackers quickly field test prototype attacks that dodge current defenses. The defenders reverse engineer the attacks, craft new defenses, which need to be tested to avoid harming the defender’s clients. This cycle of new threats field tested, followed by the development of new defenses based on the new attacks represents an escalation that the defender industry cannot win. Therefore, the Anti-Malware industry needs to evolve in at least two significant ways. First, the need for an Anti-Malware ecosystem, where researchers and companies collaborate instead of compete is needed. Second, the design and implementation of innovative Malware defenses must be based on knowledgeabout emerging threats gained through research. Within this context, the evolving threat landscape track is interested in exploring the current attacker’s arsenal. • Innovative System Defense: : While system defense requires technical innovations, we recognize that it depends equally on enterprise policies, after the fact forensics, and system monitoring. System defenders need to balance a number of conflicting factors:
Users must be authenticated;
Insider threats must be located; and
Privacy must be safeguarded.
The enterprise depends on off-the-shelf products that are rarely secure. Sometimes security systems become attack vectors. Defense personnel are also forced to balance competing legal requirements.
The defense track is soliciting papers with technical innovations, insights gained from practice, relevant legal expertise, and policy definitions. Topics of special interest include:
Privacy preservation,
Identity maintenance,
Security policies,
Online criminal enterprise identification/discovery,
Advances in reverse engineering,
Cloud security,
Data forensics,
Challenges of attribution in malware analysis
Defense effectiveness evaluation methods
Network monitoring, and
Software defined network security.
In addition to the above themes submissions are solicited in, but not limited to, the following areas as well:
• Combating Broad Spectrum Malware amidst changing reality of network walls and end-point trusted zones.
• Evolving nature of cyberattacks, including advanced targeted attacks, ransomware, crypto lockers, phishing, etc.
• Malware and its impact in social networking and cloud computing.
• Enterprise security in the presence of BYOD devices and smartphone malware.
• Analysis and measurements of real malware incidents, and security architectures.
• Botnet attacks, detection/tracking and defense.
• Malware economics and black market studies.
• Code reverse engineering tools and practices.
• Malware performance, analysis and capture tools
• Legal aspects of cyber security, including risk and compliance issues impacting executive decisions.
Publication
Proceedings will be published in printed and DVD form and will be included in the IEEE Xplore digital library.