Hardware-Assisted Malware Analysis

Abstract

Malicious software (malware) are persistent threats to modern computer systems and the development of countermeasures to them becomes harder each day due to the emergence of anti-analysis and anti-forensics techniques, able to evade software-based monitoring solutions. In this scenario, hardware-assisted solutions are effective alternatives, but still present development gaps. The presented dissertation surveyed the limits of software-based solutions, pinpointed the existing development gaps on hardware-assisted solutions and introduced a lightweight, hardware-based alternative for malware analysis. The developed framework was released as open-source and is being used on further research developments.