What Is Malware Analysis?

Infiltrating or damaging a computer system without the owner’s knowledge is what malware is all about. Malware refers to any harmful programme that steals data, spies on users, or any other malicious behaviour. Traditional malware varieties, such as a virus, Trojan, or worm, will also begin to mutate as our reliance on technology and the number of linked endpoints both rise. This results in the emergence of novel types of malicious software, which launch unexpected attacks on your computers and do their damage without leaving any telltale signs.

This year, for instance, saw the introduction of the WastedLocker ransomware family, which appends a unique string including the term “wasted” to every encrypted file. The creator of the software may demand a massive ransom to unlock the file. The amount of ransomware attacks on enterprises is at an all-time high, as documented in the State of Malware Report for 2020. It is consequently essential for businesses and the ethical hacking community to advance their knowledge of harmful software in order to stay ahead of threat actors.

Because of this, malware analysis is becoming increasingly important. Malware analysis can be characterised as the “process of dissecting malware to comprehend its fundamental components and source code, investigating its features, functionality, origin, and impact to reduce the problem and avoid future occurrences.”

Let’s unpack the definition of malware analysis and its objectives:

• It breaks down the malware: Malware analysis relies heavily on raising knowledge about cyberthreats by explaining them in plain English. Malware is just malicious software. To prevent malware from entering your system or spreading throughout your ecosystem, you must have a firm grasp of the code and how it operates.
• It investigates its characteristics: Malware, like all other software, will always leave its own digital imprint. What sort of data does a certain strain of malware, or family of strains, typically target? How do people get it? How fast does it replicate, and what strategies does it employ to hide itself? Malware can be more easily identified if its specific traits are known.
• It unravels its functionality: As a crucial part of malware investigation, this is also one of the most challenging aspects to master. Malware often lurks in the background until the perfect moment to strike. This means the user won’t learn about its features until it’s too late. Malware analysis examines the program’s source code in an effort to reconstruct its original purpose.
• It traces the malware’s origin: Hackers take advantage of the difficulty in tracking malware by demanding hefty payments in exchange for the release of encrypted data. Analysis of malware makes an effort to look through the coder’s anonymity and discover more about where it came from, be it a specific person, IP address, geographical area, or even a specific company. This facilitates the quick response of law enforcement in the event of an assault.
• It tries to predict the impact: With the following lines of inquiry woven together, a likely effect profile can be derived. The worst-case impact of malware can be deduced from its features, the types of systems it targets, its rate of growth, and the methods it favours for spreading itself. Because of this, businesses can prepare for and implement preventative measures.

Analyzing malware is a highly technical skill that takes years to master. For this reason, specialised roles such as malware analysts are highly sought after. Employment opportunities for malware analysts are expanding quickly in the United States and other countries with advanced information infrastructures. Only 52 people applied to the 1,726 malware analyst jobs that were posted in June 2017. This is because analysing malware is a challenging task that calls for extensive expertise, considerable patience, and, at times, innovative approaches.

Malware Analysis Process

Here’s a more in-depth insight into the malware analysis process:

Step 1: Capture the malware.

To begin the analysis, you’ll need uncompressed access to a malicious code sample. HoneyDB is a useful tool for luring in malware and capturing it in a setting that is conducive to further examination.

Step 2: Build a malware lab.

To experiment with various malware features without endangering any adjacent files, you can set up shop in a dedicated lab for malware investigation. Virtual machines (VMs) are frequently used in malware labs to sandbox the entire process.

Step 3: Install your tools.

Malware analysis can be performed with a variety of tools, both free and commercial. You can find a lot of help on GitHub. Cuckoo Sandbox and similar analysis enablers could potentially be used. You need to get these programmes set up in your virtual machines.

Step 4: Record the baseline.

It’s important to take stock of the system before executing the virus and record your findings as a starting point. The VM-installed tools will be useful here; executing them again (after the virus has been launched) will reveal the infection’s behaviour and impact.

Step 5: Commence your investigation.

The inquiry process entails a number of stages. Some processes are best left to humans, while others can benefit greatly from automation software. Dissect the malware in advance of starting these steps to learn its inner workings.

Step 6: Document the results.

With the right set of tools, you can learn everything about how malware operates, what patterns it follows, and how it interacts with the rest of the internet. Please compile these findings into a detailed report as the final product of your malware analysis project.

Today’s cybersecurity advancements revolve around malware analysis. In order to further the understanding of malware, analysts might collaborate with governmental agencies, non-profits, academic institutions, and private companies.

Types of Malware Analysis

Static and dynamic malware analysis are the two main categories. Malware analysis can be categorised as either manual or automated, depending on how much work you want to put into it. Combining all of these categories into one comprehensive analysis exercise allows researchers to learn more about the virus and see how it responds to various interventions.

Types of Malware Analysis

1. Static malware analysis

Static and dynamic components can both be found in malware programming. Analyses of this kind look upon inert features, such as metadata, headers, embedded assets, etc., rather than dynamic ones. Static analysis can expose enough about the software to allow for the creation of an indication of compromise (IOC), a record of the malware’s malicious nature. If static analysis returns a positive result, the code is typically ignored as garbage, not worthy of further scrutiny as malware.

2. Dynamic malware analysis

Malware can be tested for its behaviour in a simulated environment using dynamic analysis. Dynamic analysis requires the use of virtual machines because it is highly likely that the malware will destroy the host system.

During dynamic malware analysis, it is important to pay attention to the malware’s interactions with network traffic, targeting patterns towards the file system, and changes to the registry, among other behavioural signals.

Such analysis can be performed using tools like CIRCL’s Dynamic Malware Analysis Platform (DMA).

Filtering files is just one of several tasks performed by VMRAY’s “Now, Near, Deep” architecture, which uses dynamic analysis.

You can find out more about the malware’s behaviour patterns by comparing the baselines of the host environment taken before and after performing dynamic analysis. That’s why you could sometimes hear it referred to as a “behaviour analysis.”

3. Manual malware analysis

With manual analysis, the analyst takes the initiative to disassemble the code without the use of automated tools like debuggers, compilers, or decrypters. Because the analyst looks at the algorithm’s underlying logic and tries to forecast the logic behind pieces that seem extraneous at first glance, manual analysis typically discloses the strategic aim behind harmful software.

Manual analysis, or “code reversing,” is a term used to describe the process of starting with the completed programme and working backwards through the code until you reach the original logic.

4. Automated malware analysis

Through automated analysis, several behavioural and static aspects of the malware are examined. While this may not tell us anything about the program’s inner workings, it is incredibly helpful for determining its likely classification and the malware family to which it belongs.

Information can be fed into an incident response system and detailed reports can be generated automatically, with only the most important signals being presented to a human analyst.

Some tools that can assist with this task include the Falcon Sandbox and the AI-driven SNDBOX.

The various forms of malware analysis have distinct functions. To get a complete view of the malicious app’s capabilities and how to prevent its entry into user systems, it is best to run all of them simultaneously. In particular, the manual code reversal method can help uncover the motivations behind malware development.

Key Stages of Malware Analysis

Analysis of malware can be divided into three main phases. These align with the aforementioned malware analysis kinds, providing a more in-depth look into the aforementioned aspects of the virus’s identity and characteristics.

1. Observing malware behavior

Malware analysts use tools or perform brief manual tasks to get a response early on. Once the malware responds to its environment (on a VM), it is simpler to determine if it is benign or dangerous. Wireshark, which can mimic a variety of network situations and investigate malware activity in the presence of several protocols, is a popular tool for this purpose. Running antivirus software in a virtual setting to observe how malware reacts would be an easy way to conduct behavioural research. Behavioral analysis frameworks allow you to develop a reusable analysis script that takes the malware through its paces in a live virtual environment, combining the best of automation and manual strategy.

2. Disassembling the code

There are two parts to decompilation: static analysis (which examines the fixed parts of the virus code) and the program’s “moving parts,” or its logic. Malware analysts should be familiar with binary and assembly language, as code deconstruction depends heavily on manual labour. A ready-to-use disassembler might be used to decompile the malware software, translating the binary code into assembly language. There are three types of tools that are usually useful at this stage:

• A disassembler breaks down the malware into its component parts and then rebuilds it in human-readable assembly code.
• A debugger walks through the code and draws attention to parts that look suspect so that a malware analyst can dig into them.
• A decompiler reproducing a program’s original source code is a useful technique for tracking down its creator since it provides a digital fingerprint of the original code.

The first two steps examine the malware’s outward appearance and its natural behaviour in the environment; the third and final step examines the malware’s probable consequences.

3. Examining the memory

The next step is investigating the malware’s traces in your computer’s RAM as a form of forensic evidence. Since most malicious software is under 1MB in size, its memory footprint is hard to detect in typical computing settings. Malware analysis labs offer the controlled environments required to perform pre-malware memory benchmarking, malware execution, and artefact extraction.

Memory analysis is challenging because it requires sifting through the smallest digital traces left by a programme that was supposed to be undetectable. Memoryze is a free utility that examines memory pictures to list all running processes (including hidden ones), identify loaded drivers, check driver signatures, and reveal any open network ports, among other things.

Thus, this phase of the malware’s life cycle provides additional behavioural data after the infection has finished its destructive operation.

Our goal throughout these three phases is to gain a deeper understanding of the malware, its inner workings, and how it would react in certain situations. Malware analysts can streamline their work by adhering to a few simple guidelines.