Inspired by how ants protect their colony when it is threatened, few programmers are testing an antivirus programme which they say could find foolproof protection for computers against virus.
This sort of ‘swarming intelligence’ is currently being tested for use in software by a team at Wake Forest University in North Carolina in partnership with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PPNL).
Led by Errin Fulp, a professor of computer science at Wake Forest University, the team is training an army of ‘digital ants’ to turn loose into the power grid to seek out computer viruses trying to wreak havoc on the system.
If the approach proves successful, it could have wide-ranging applications on protecting anything connected to SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) networks, computer systems that control everything from water and sewer management systems to mass transit systems to manufacturing systems.
Unlike traditional security approaches, which are static, digital ants wander through computer networks looking for threats such as computer worms, self-replicating programs designed to steal information or facilitate unauthorised use of computers.
When a digital ant detects a threat, it summons an army of ants to converge at that location, drawing the attention of human operators to investigate.
"The idea is to deploy thousands of different types of digital ants, each looking for evidence of a threat," Fulp said.
"As they move about the network, they leave digital trails modeled after the scent trails ants in nature use to guide other ants. Each time a digital ant identifies some evidence, it is programmed to leave behind a stronger scent. Stronger scent trails attract more ants, producing the swarm that marks a potential computer infection," Fulp added.
