Modeling the Spatio-Temporal Dynamics of Worm Propagation in Smartphones Based on Cellular Automata

Abstract

In recent years, the expanding smartphone market has become an increasingly attractive target for malicious attacks. This has motivated the continuous development of models to understand the behavior of smartphone malware and describe its spatial propagation. One of possible communication channels for the penetration of mobile malware is the Bluetooth interface, where the malware infects devices in its proximity as biological virus does. In this paper, a new mathematical model to study the spatio-temporal propagation dynamics of Bluetooth worms based on cellular automata and the compartmental epidemiological models is introduced. The model takes into account the local interactions between the smartphones and it is able to simulate the individual dynamic of each mobile device. Furthermore, the model consider the effect of mobility on the infection propagation. Some simulation results indicate that the model captures the spatio-temporal dynamics of Bluetooth worm propagation and facilitates predictions of the evolution of the malware spreading. In addition, the computational cost of the model is low, making it suitable to understand the behavior of a modeled malware and predict the spreading curves of Bluetooth worm propagation in large areas.