Adaptive Cybersecurity Neural Networks: An Evolutionary Approach for Enhanced Attack Detection and Classification

Abstract

The increasing sophistication and frequency of cyber threats necessitate the development of advanced techniques for detecting and mitigating attacks. This paper introduces a novel cybersecurity-focused Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP) trainer that utilizes evolutionary computation methods, specifically tailored to improve the training process of neural networks in the cybersecurity domain. The proposed trainer dynamically optimizes the MLP’s weights and biases, enhancing its accuracy and robustness in defending against various attack vectors. To evaluate its effectiveness, the trainer was tested on five widely recognized security-related datasets: NSL-KDD, CICIDS2017, UNSW-NB15, Bot-IoT, and CSE-CIC-IDS2018. Its performance was compared with several state-of-the-art optimization algorithms, including Cybersecurity Chimp, CPO, ROA, WOA, MFO, WSO, SHIO, ZOA, DOA, and HHO. The results demonstrated that the proposed trainer consistently outperformed the other algorithms, achieving the lowest Mean Square Error (MSE) and highest classification accuracy across all datasets. Notably, the trainer reached a classification rate of 99.5% on the Bot-IoT dataset and 98.8% on the CSE-CIC-IDS2018 dataset, underscoring its effectiveness in detecting and classifying diverse cyber threats.