Capturing the interplay between malware and anti-malware in a computer network

•The impact of anti-malwares on malicious objects in a network has been studied.•Approach similar to viral dynamics in vivo is adopted to model computer virology.•A threshold R requisite for attaining infection-free network is obtained.•Baseline potency of anti-malwares is found to have a large impact on threshold R.•An expression for critical baseline potency of anti-malwares is obtained.

In an era with affluence of local area networks, the recurrent attacks of viruses and other malicious objects are undoubtedly an intruding threat. These malicious objects spread quickly through an unprotected network, corrupt the data and harm the nodes. To comprehend this problem and its plausible solutions more thoroughly, we have proposed and analyzed a mathematical model by considering a network in which nodes are either infected or prone to it. It is considered that nodes vulnerable to infection become infected, when attacked by malicious objects present in the network. To minimize the abundance of malicious objects and infected nodes, some anti-malware softwares are installed in the network, which are continuously being updated. On analyzing the proposed model, we obtained two equilibria and a threshold governing the dynamics of malicious objects in a computer network. The characterization of stability behavior of obtained equilibria is also discussed in detail. The numerical simulation illustrates the validity of analytically obtained results.