From product recommendation to cyber-attack prediction: Generating attack graphs and predicting future attacks

TL;DR

This paper introduces a method for constructing attack graphs from maritime infrastructure data and employs recommender systems to predict future cyber-attacks, aiding in risk management.

Contribution

It presents a novel approach combining attack graph generation with recommender systems for predicting cyber-attacks in infrastructure networks.

Findings

The method effectively identifies all exploitable attack paths.

Recommender systems can accurately predict potential future attacks.

The approach is practical and validated through experiments.

Abstract

Modern information society depends on reliable functionality of information systems infrastructure, while at the same time the number of cyber-attacks has been increasing over the years and damages have been caused. Furthermore, graphs can be used to show paths than can be exploited by attackers to intrude into systems and gain unauthorized access through vulnerability exploitation. This paper presents a method that builds attack graphs using data supplied from the maritime supply chain infrastructure. The method delivers all possible paths that can be exploited to gain access. Then, a recommendation system is utilized to make predictions about future attack steps within the network. We show that recommender systems can be used in cyber defense by predicting attacks. The goal of this paper is to identify attack paths and show how a recommendation method can be used to classify future cyber-attacks in terms of risk management. The proposed method has been experimentally evaluated and validated, with the results showing that it is both practical and effective.