TSE-IDS: A Two-Stage Classifier Ensemble for Intelligent Anomaly-based Intrusion Detection System

Intrusion detection systems (IDS) play a pivotal role in computer security by discovering and repealing malicious activities in computer networks. Anomaly-based IDS, in particular, rely on classification models trained using historical data to discover such malicious activities. In this paper, an improved IDS based on hybrid feature selection and two-level classifier ensembles is proposed. An hybrid feature selection technique comprising three methods, i.e. particle swarm optimization, ant colony algorithm, and genetic algorithm, is utilized to reduce the feature size of the training datasets (NSL-KDD and UNSW-NB15 are considered in this paper). Features are selected based on the classification performance of a reduced error pruning tree (REPT) classifier. Then, a two-level classifier ensembles based on two meta learners, i.e., rotation forest and bagging, is proposed. On the NSL-KDD dataset, the proposed classifier shows 85.8% accuracy, 86.8% sensitivity, and 88.0% detection rate, which remarkably outperform other classification techniques recently proposed in the literature. Results regarding the UNSW-NB15 dataset also improve the ones achieved by several state of the art techniques. Finally, to verify the results, a two-step statistical significance test is conducted. This is not usually considered by IDS research thus far and, therefore, adds value to the experimental results achieved by the proposed classifier

Identification of disease-causing genes using microarray data mining and gene ontology

Background: One of the best and most accurate methods for identifying disease-causing genes is monitoring gene expression values in different samples using microarray technology. One of the shortcomings of microarray data is that they provide a small quantity of samples with respect to the number of genes. This problem reduces the classification accuracy of the methods, so gene selection is essential to improve the predictive accuracy and to identify potential marker genes for a disease. Among numerous existing methods for gene selection, support vector machine-based recursive feature elimination (SVMRFE) has become one of the leading methods, but its performance can be reduced because of the small sample size, noisy data and the fact that the method does not remove redundant genes. Methods: We propose a novel framework for gene selection which uses the advantageous features of conventional methods and addresses their weaknesses. In fact, we have combined the Fisher method and SVMRFE to utilize the advantages of a filtering method as well as an embedded method. Furthermore, we have added a redundancy reduction stage to address the weakness of the Fisher method and SVMRFE. In addition to gene expression values, the proposed method uses Gene Ontology which is a reliable source of information on genes. The use of Gene Ontology can compensate, in part, for the limitations of microarrays, such as having a small number of samples and erroneous measurement results. Results: The proposed method has been applied to colon, Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma (DLBCL) and prostate cancer datasets. The empirical results show that our method has improved classification performance in terms of accuracy, sensitivity and specificity. In addition, the study of the molecular function of selected genes strengthened the hypothesis that these genes are involved in the process of cancer growth. Conclusions: The proposed method addresses the weakness of conventional methods by adding a redundancy reduction stage and utilizing Gene Ontology information. It predicts marker genes for colon, DLBCL and prostate cancer with a high accuracy. The predictions made in this study can serve as a list of candidates for subsequent wet-lab verification and might help in the search for a cure for cancers