Study of Computer Malware and Its Taxonomy

Bishir Suleiman, Rashid Husain

There are widespread availability and use of information technology devices capable of accessing the Internet from any remote location. While communicating via the Internet, each of these devices face a major challenge - malicious codes that alter their actual behavior, function, etc. Malicious codes result in heavy damages to computer owners, users, and the society at large. This study describes the general architecture of computer malware. It focuses on the classification of computer malware using three (3) suitable criteria. It proposes the likely properties of future computer malware going by the trend in their development. Our future work would focus on developing a model for worm-attack and simulating it against campus network. It choose computer worms because of the enormous devastating effects they cause as commonly experienced on computers connected via network.