Benchmarking Android Malware Detection: Traditional vs. Deep Learning Models

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Liu, Guojun, Caragea, Doina, Ou, Xinming, Roy, Sankardas
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2025
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author Liu, Guojun
Caragea, Doina
Ou, Xinming
Roy, Sankardas
author_facet Liu, Guojun
Caragea, Doina
Ou, Xinming
Roy, Sankardas
contents Android malware detection has been extensively studied using both traditional machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL) approaches. While many state-of-the-art detection models, particularly those based on DL, claim superior performance, they often rely on limited comparisons, lacking comprehensive benchmarking against traditional ML models across diverse datasets. This raises concerns about the robustness of DL-based approaches' performance and the potential oversight of simpler, more efficient ML models. In this paper, we conduct a systematic evaluation of Android malware detection models across four datasets: three recently published, publicly available datasets and a large-scale dataset we systematically collected. We implement a range of traditional ML models, including Random Forests (RF) and CatBoost, alongside advanced DL models such as Capsule Graph Neural Networks (CapsGNN), BERT-based models, and ExcelFormer based models. Our results reveal that in many cases simpler and more computationally efficient ML models achieve comparable or even superior performance compared with DL models. These findings highlight the need for rigorous benchmarking in Android malware detection research. We encourage future studies to conduct more comprehensive benchmarking comparisons between traditional and advanced models to ensure a more accurate assessment of detection capabilities. To facilitate further research, we provide access to our dataset, including app IDs, hash values, and labels.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2502_15041
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Benchmarking Android Malware Detection: Traditional vs. Deep Learning Models
Liu, Guojun
Caragea, Doina
Ou, Xinming
Roy, Sankardas
Cryptography and Security
Android malware detection has been extensively studied using both traditional machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL) approaches. While many state-of-the-art detection models, particularly those based on DL, claim superior performance, they often rely on limited comparisons, lacking comprehensive benchmarking against traditional ML models across diverse datasets. This raises concerns about the robustness of DL-based approaches' performance and the potential oversight of simpler, more efficient ML models. In this paper, we conduct a systematic evaluation of Android malware detection models across four datasets: three recently published, publicly available datasets and a large-scale dataset we systematically collected. We implement a range of traditional ML models, including Random Forests (RF) and CatBoost, alongside advanced DL models such as Capsule Graph Neural Networks (CapsGNN), BERT-based models, and ExcelFormer based models. Our results reveal that in many cases simpler and more computationally efficient ML models achieve comparable or even superior performance compared with DL models. These findings highlight the need for rigorous benchmarking in Android malware detection research. We encourage future studies to conduct more comprehensive benchmarking comparisons between traditional and advanced models to ensure a more accurate assessment of detection capabilities. To facilitate further research, we provide access to our dataset, including app IDs, hash values, and labels.
title Benchmarking Android Malware Detection: Traditional vs. Deep Learning Models
topic Cryptography and Security
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.15041