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MalSFF: Multi-architecture malware detection using multi-static feature fusion based on image visualization and learning methods

delete2025-11-10
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PRE
AI
S
Sanjeev Kumar *
A
Anil Kumar
DOI:10.1016/j.compeleceng.2025.110834delete
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Abstract

Abstract

En 中文
Malware detection is a necessity in the modern digital world. This research presents a novel MalSFF: Multi-Architecture Malware Detection Using Multi-Static Feature Fusion Based on visual image analysis and transfer learning. Firstly, it decompiles binary programs to extract bytecodes and assembly code (ASM) through reverse-engineering before transforming them into grayscale images. This research strategically fine-tunes the MobileNet models (V1, V2, V3-Small, and V3-Large) for feature extraction of both file types. Thereafter, it performs feature stacking through early fusion, late fusion, and ensemble voting to obtain a single feature map, and then utilizes a filter-based feature selection algorithm. Finally, the MalSFF employs six different classifiers, with optimized hyperparameters using an automated grid-search algorithm. For better generalization, this study uses four different datasets: (i) Microsoft BIG, (ii) MalImg, (iii) Dumpware10, and (iv) Real-world samples. The MalSFF achieved 98.72% accuracy for the MalImg and 96.93% accuracy, 97% precision, 97% recall, and 97% F1-score, 0.012 ms of response time for the BIG dataset. For memory-resident malware, it achieved 93.84% accuracy and a 91% F1-score, with a response time of only 0.05 s. The MalSFF demonstrates resilience against FGSM, PGD, and DeepFool adversarial attacks. The MalSFF is a lightweight and computationally efficient, well-suited for resource-constrained IIoT networks.

Journal

C
Computers and Electrical Engineering
IF:
4.9
Papers:
6.7K
Citations:
1.3W

Organization

C
Centre for Development of Advanced Computing
Scholars:
38
Papers: 18
Citations: 184
L
London Metropolitan University
Scholars:
931
Papers: 1.0K
Citations: 1.0K