Australian students, researchers and industry professionals have developed a suite of cutting-edge cyber honeypot technology. DecaaS (Deception as a Service) uses machine learning models to create highly realistic but fake versions of data and digital assets that are attractive to hackers.

This approach of using honey pots and cyber deception is a method of finding out quickly if people have broken into our systems, and we can gain intelligence about the intent, equipment and processes our adversaries are using.

The project’s lead researcher, Dr Kristen Moore of Australia’s national science agency, CSIRO, explained:

“The DecaaS project team have developed models to generate fake content and traffic, including code repositories, email servers, Wi-Fi traffic and Wiki corpuses, to create a convincing and appealing cyber honeypot. Adversaries are leveraging AI (Artificial Intelligence) and deception, and getting far with it, so we need to do the same”.
– Dr Kristen Moore, CSIRO

A collaboration between the Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre, CSIRO’s Data61 and Australian-based cyber company Penten, DecaaS is in the process of commercialisation.

Those involved in the project say the big gains were made from a unique working environment where students worked hand in hand with industry, which led to a wealth of knowledge transfer between both parties.

Source:
Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre

“These are real world threats with potentially devastating consequences, the team is solving research challenges that can impact how people use the Penten product and improve overall cyber posture”.
– Rachael Falk, CEO of Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre

Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre CEO Rachael Falk also said it’s fantastic to see the students and researchers solving hard problems.