IoT Security: Botnet Detection Using Self-Organizing Feature Map and Machine Learning

The rapid advancement of Internet of Things (IoT) technology has created potential for progress in various aspects of life. However, the increasing number of IoT devices also raises the risk of cyberattacks, particularly IoT botnets often exploited by attackers. This is largely due to the limitations of IoT devices, such as constraints in capacity, power, and memory, necessitating an efficient detection system. This study aims to develop a resource-efficient botnet detection system by using the Self-Organizing Feature Map (SOFM) dimensionality reduction method in combination with machine learning algorithms. The proposed method includes a feature engineering process using SOFM to address high-dimensional data, followed by classification with various machine learning algorithms. The experiments evaluate performance based on accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, False Positive Rate (FPR), and False Negative Rate (FNR). Results show that the Decision Tree algorithm achieved the highest accuracy rate of 97.24%, with a sensitivity of 0.9523, specificity of 0.9932, and a fast execution time of 100.66 seconds. The use of SOFM successfully reduced memory consumption from 3.08 GB to 923MB. Experimental results indicate that this approach is effective for enhancing IoT security in resource-constrained devices.