# An Argumentation-Based Reasoner to Assist Digital Investigation and Attribution of Cyber-Attacks

## TL;DR

This paper introduces an argumentation-based reasoner (ABR) that aids cyber-attack investigation by analyzing evidence, handling conflicting information, and suggesting investigation directions, integrating technical and social evidence for attribution.

## Contribution

It presents the first automatic reasoner capable of combining technical and social evidence in cyber-attack analysis, even with incomplete or conflicting data.

## Key findings

- ABR can analyze diverse evidence types effectively.
- It helps identify attack perpetrators and suggests further investigation paths.
- Demonstrated with real-world cyber-attack examples.

## Abstract

We expect an increase in the frequency and severity of cyber-attacks that comes along with the need for efficient security countermeasures. The process of attributing a cyber-attack helps to construct efficient and targeted mitigating and preventive security measures. In this work, we propose an argumentation-based reasoner (ABR) as a proof-of-concept tool that can help a forensics analyst during the analysis of forensic evidence and the attribution process. Given the evidence collected from a cyber-attack, our reasoner can assist the analyst during the investigation process, by helping him/her to analyze the evidence and identify who performed the attack. Furthermore, it suggests to the analyst where to focus further analyses by giving hints of the missing evidence or new investigation paths to follow. ABR is the first automatic reasoner that can combine both technical and social evidence in the analysis of a cyber-attack, and that can also cope with incomplete and conflicting information. To illustrate how ABR can assist in the analysis and attribution of cyber-attacks we have used examples of cyber-attacks and their analyses as reported in publicly available reports and online literature. We do not mean to either agree or disagree with the analyses presented therein or reach attribution conclusions.