Functional similarities between computer worms and biological pathogens

Computer worms pose a serious threat to computer and network security. Interestingly, they share many common tactics with biological pathogens with respect to infecting and propagating. In this paper, we study the six most common fatal infectious diseases—measles, malaria, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, influenza and the diarrhoeal diseases—to (1) determine the individual mechanisms and environmental conditions that have contributed to their success, and (2) show the parallels between the mechanisms and behavior of successful biological infections and successful digital infections. Moreover, by identifying the specific areas of similarity and looking at effective preventive and creative measures used against biological pathogens, we draw insights about what steps individual computers and networks can take to protect themselves.