Digital Ants Used to Battle Internet Worms

[tektek]

This sounds like some Anime you'd see coming from Japan... Mecha Ants vs Pokemon/Digimon Worms...

I need to tell my little brother to stop watching tv in my room.. ughh!!

 

[Guest]

This concept is not new at all (maybe the application is). They use a method called Ant Colony Optimization (look for it in Wikipedia).

 

[WheelsOfConfusion]

So this is strictly an intra-network thing for the foreseeable future? Sounds like a novel approach to antivirus and malware, wonder how well it would scale over the internet. Imagine if they could tag botnets as they cropped up.

 

[waxdart]

How many ants does it take to get a DOS on your own machine? Sound like a load of tosh to me.

 

[caskachan]

and then someone parasites the ants...
LOL

 

[r0x0r]

What if someone codes up an anteater?

 

[darkxuy]

Well, there is always the danger they will be overrun by the ants.
Don't worry though, they can bring in Chinese Needle Snakes to eat the ants.
And if the snakes become a problem, all they have to do is import snake-eating gorillas.

 

[extreme-pcs]

Yes... soon the ants will become self-aware, and we'll need to send a digital aardvark back in time to kill the ants!

 

[Regulas]

All your code belong to us. Skynet in it's infancy.

 

[leo2kp]

The ants will too get out of control and they'll need to make the iCocroach, which will give way to the iWasp, then the iLizzard, then the iOwl...it'll never end until the Internet is destroyed by the iNukes. Only the iCocroach will survive.

 

[r3t4rd]

Don't worry, if the Ants become self-aware and turn into Skynet, we can all just switch over to MACs. Its been proven, MACs don't get worms, viruses, Trojans, or even Ants.

Steve Jobs will be "John Connor". We must protect Steve Jobs or all is lost!!!

 

[claudeb]

I prefer digital T-Rex myself

 

[wild9]

[citation][nom]ben850[/nom]one would have to put quite a bit of trust into a company that releases these.. assuming they'd be allowed "crawl through" your firewalls and leave "cookies" all over your network.[/citation]

Exactly. Real ants send out scouting parties to determine threat levels..what would happen if, for instance, these 'ants' were designed to hunt down views opposing governmental policy, construing them as a 'threat' in much the same way terrorism is treated? The information they gather and in the wrong hands could be a significant threat to one's privacy and security, in my opinion.

This sounds like a decent idea in principle. I just have visions of backdoor legislation pushing through amendments and backdoor legislation, in order to wire-tap more than just run-of-the-mill trojans and the like. And it's all done so silently, so discreetly..so efficiently.

 

[Guest]

probably works,for as long as the worm does not shut down the internet connection, or allows worm access only!

I doubt this method is a good one. It's just creating a harmless worm to attack some other worms. But it's basics are a worm nevertheless.
What's going to happen next? Worms transforming into butterflies, or ant eating insects?
Before we know it we'll all be taking part in the cyberwar, and won't be able to internet normal anymore!

 

[eyemaster]

This sounds really complicated to implement! I can understand how a normal program works, but I can't put my head around this one.

 

[agentjon]

[citation][nom]r3t4rd[/nom]Don't worry, if the Ants become self-aware and turn into Skynet, we can all just switch over to MACs. Its been proven, MACs don't get worms, viruses, Trojans, or even Ants. Steve Jobs will be "John Connor". We must protect Steve Jobs or all is lost!!![/citation]
Steve Jobs is the devil incarnate.
Gates is only the beast.

 

[mjello]

But what happens when the swarm gains consciousness, and decide humans are the source of the security problem. Will they start threating the source of the problem or still be content to just keep fixing the problem.... Skynet... you will be born in an anthill, not reconstructed from a cyborg.

 

[ncarlson]

This kind of technology looks awesome! I can't see how a company can make a "product" using this technology, for example, antivirus/antispyware. I'm making a logical guess that this could be deployed on large/complex corporate networks for protection. For average home use, this would be unnecessary.

 

[smokinu]

[citation][nom]claudeb[/nom]I prefer digital T-Rex myself[/citation]

Have a look at this article Even one of the top mac security guru's says mac not as secure as windows based pc's.

http/www.tomshardware.com/news/hack-windows-security-snow-leopard,8704.html