A Model of Diversity and Resistance to Attack in an Adaptive Software Network

The feasibility of automatically evolving software patches has been demonstrated by Forrest and Weimer [2]. In this paper we describe a model of a network of computers, each capable of evolving in response to an attack, bug, or vulnerability. Such a network may develop a diversity of software over time. We model such a network in order to explore the effects of different attack patterns and patch-sharing paradigms on the software diversity across the whole network. We wish to eventually investigate whether software diversity throughout a network confers increased resistance to novel attacks.