Biology Inspired Cyber Security: SCIT the Digital Vaccine

SCIT protects servers against known and unknown malware attacks, like a flu vaccine protects against specific known flu viruses and unknown future strains.

Vaccines have been successfully used to significantly reduce the risk of certain diseases. For 
example, the small pox vaccine has eliminated small pox. Polio vaccine is another success 
story. In both cases the vaccines, with requisite boosters, immunize the patient for life and are 
very successful.

On the other hand there are vaccines that have limited goals but are still very useful. The flu 
vaccine provides immunity against three specific strains and has to be applied every year. From 
among the many strains, the vaccine manufacturer research estimates the three strains that will 
be most prevalent and develops protection against these strains. Thus one can be infected by 
one of the flu strains that is not protected by flu vaccine. However, doctors note that if one is 
vaccinated, one may get the flu, but the flu vaccine reduces the intensity of the infection and 
speeds recovery.

There is another important reason for getting vaccinated - the vaccination not only protects the 
individual but also the community. For example, the flu vaccine is recommended by the CDC 
not only to protect individuals, but also to prevent the spread of the flu (fewer people getting 
the flu = fewer people spreading the flu) each season. In addition to the vaccine, everyone is 
encouraged to obey simple rules (wash your hands often) so as to frequently restore the system to 
a clean state, thus prevent spread of infection.

SCIT is a digital vaccine that removes the malware and viruses every cycle (the short period 
of time the active virtual machine is online). Like the flu, new variants of the malware 
continuously appear, and restoring systems to a clean state (like washing hands) reduces the 
chance of infection. The cycle duration is chosen by the user – as short as one minute or as long
as a hour. SCIT servers are protected from long presence of the malware or virus on the servers 
– thus making it difficult to infect other servers in the system. SCIT server damage is limited 
by the duration of exposure time of the server to the internet, and the automatic recovery to a 
pristine state is included in the SCIT server cycle. SCIT technology complements the current 
reactive systems like firewalls, IDS and IPS; and leads to further reduction in malicious data ex-
filtration.