IP Library Granted Patent US 12,407,717
Granted Patent B2
US 12,407,717 · App. 18/104,137 · Granted Sep 2, 2025

Machine learning architecture for detecting malicious files using stream of data

Inventors: William Redington Hewlett, II (Mountain View, CA); Sujit Rokka Chhetri (Santa Clara, CA); Brody James Kutt (Santa Clara, CA); Shan Huang (San Jose, CA); Nandini Ramanan (Sunnyvale, CA); Sheng Yang (Santa Clara, CA); Min Du (Santa Clara, CA)
Assignee: Palo Alto Networks, Inc.
H04L63/145H04L41/16
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Quick Facts
Patent No.
US 12,407,717
App. No.
18/104,137
Granted
Sep 2, 2025
Kind
B2
Abstract

The present application discloses a method, system, and computer system for classifying stream data at an edge device. The method includes obtaining a stream of a file at the edge device, aligning a predetermined amount of data in chunks associated with the stream of the file, processing a plurality of aligned chunks associated with the stream of the file using a machine learning model, and classifying, at the edge device, the file based at least in part on a classification of the plurality of aligned chunks.

Claims (49)

1. A system for performing classification at an edge device, comprising:

one or more processors configured to:

obtain a stream of a file at the edge device;

align a predetermined amount of data in chunks associated with the stream of the file, wherein aligning the predetermined amount of data in chunks associated with the stream of the file comprises:

determining an nth file segment based at least in part on associating a predetermined amount of an ith chunk with a predetermined amount of a jth chunk, wherein i and j are positive integers, and j is greater than i;

process a plurality of aligned chunks associated with the stream of the file using a machine learning model; and

classify, at the edge device, the file based at least in part on a classification of the plurality of aligned chunks, wherein the file is classified based at least in part on a classification of the nth file segment; and

a memory coupled to the one or more processors and configured to provide the one or more processors with instructions.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the edge device is a network device.

3. The system of claim 1 , wherein the edge device is an inline security entity.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein the machine learning model is configured to classify whether the file is malicious.

5. The system of claim 1 , wherein the file is classified using the machine learning model before an entirety of the file is processed.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein a first chunk comprises overhead associated with the file.

7. The system of claim 1 , wherein:

determining an nth file segment based at least in part on associating a predetermined amount of an ith chunk with a predetermined amount of a jth chunk comprises:

determining a first file segment based at least in part on associating a predetermined amount of a first chunk with a predetermined amount of a second chunk;

processing the plurality of aligned chunks comprises querying the machine learning model based on the first file segment; and

the file is classified based at least in part on a classification of the first file segment.

8. The system of claim 1 , wherein:

processing the plurality of aligned chunks comprises querying the machine learning model based on the nth file segment.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein the nth file segment comprises a predetermined number of bytes.

10. The system of claim 8 , wherein the nth file segment comprises 1500 bytes.

11. The system of claim 8 , wherein the one or more processors are configured to select the predetermined number of bytes from among a set of preset numbers of bytes, the predetermined number of bytes being selected based on a packet size of the file.

12. The system of claim 1 , wherein the aligning the predetermined amount of data in chunks adjusts for file overhead in a first chunk and ensures that classification comprises processing a same number of bytes of the file for each alignment-adjusted chunk.

13. The system of claim 1 , wherein using the machine learning model to classify the file based on a predefined number of bytes is deterministic.

14. The system of claim 1 , wherein the file is determined to be malicious if a prediction obtained from the machine learning model exceeds a predefined malicious threshold.

15. The system of claim 14 , wherein the file is determined to be malicious after an nth file segment is processed using the machine learning model, n corresponding to a positive integer that is less than a total number of chunks in the file.

16. The system of claim 14 , wherein the predefined malicious threshold is constant for each file segment in the file.

17. The system of claim 14 , wherein the predefined malicious threshold is dynamic across classification of file segment in the file.

18. The system of claim 14 , wherein in response to determining that the file is malicious, an active measure for malicious files is implemented.

19. The system of claim 1 , wherein the machine learning model is trained using a deep learning process.

20. The system of claim 15 , wherein the deep learning process comprises a convolutional neural network.

21. The system of claim 20 , wherein the convolutional neural network uses a kernel size less than 12.

22. The system of claim 20 , wherein the convolutional neural network uses a kernel size of 8.

23. The system of claim 1 , wherein a number of characters for which state information is stored for evaluation of aligned chunks is based at least in part on a kernel size of the convolutional neural network.

24. The system of claim 1 , wherein the machine learning model is an XGBoost model.

25. A method for performing classification at an edge device, comprising:

obtaining, by one or more processors, a stream of a file at the edge device;

aligning a predetermined amount of data in chunks associated with the stream of the file, wherein aligning the predetermined amount of data in chunks associated with the stream of the file comprises:

determining an nth file segment based at least in part on associating a predetermined amount of an ith chunk with a predetermined amount of a jth chunk, wherein i and i are positive integers, and j is greater than i;

processing a plurality of aligned chunks associated with the stream of the file using a machine learning model; and

classifying, at the edge device, the file based at least in part on a classification of the plurality of aligned chunks, wherein the file is classified based at least in part on a classification of the nth file segment.

26. A computer program product embodied in a non-transitory computer readable medium for performing classification at an edge device, and the computer program product comprising computer instructions for:

obtaining, by one or more processors, a stream of a file at the edge device;

aligning a predetermined amount of data in chunks associated with the stream of the file, wherein aligning the predetermined amount of data in chunks associated with the stream of the file comprises:

determining an nth file segment based at least in part on associating a predetermined amount of an ith chunk with a predetermined amount of a jth chunk, wherein i and j are positive integers, and j is greater than i;

processing a plurality of aligned chunks associated with the stream of the file using a machine learning model; and

classifying, at the edge device, the file based at least in part on a classification of the plurality of aligned chunks, wherein the file is classified based at least in part on a classification of the nth file segment.

27. The system of claim 1 , wherein the predetermined amount of data is aligned in chunks associated with the stream of the file based at least in part on a predefined chunk size and a file segment size for segments of the stream of the file.

Assignments (1)
ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST Recorded May 1, 2023
From: HEWLETT II, WILLIAM REDINGTON; CHHETRI, SUJIT ROKKA; KUTT, BRODY JAMES; HUANG, SHAN; RAMANAN, NANDINI; YANG, SHENG; DU, MIN
To: PALO ALTO NETWORKS, INC.
Reel/Frame 063492/0856 →
Continuity (1)
Related Publication 20240259420A1 · Aug 1, 2024
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