Radianti, Jaziar with Eliot Rich and Jose Gonzalez, "Refinement of Supply and Demand Model for Vulnerability Black Market", 2010 July 25-2010 July 29
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Vulnerability black markets (VBMs) are sites for trading malicious tools targeting software vulnerabilities. VBMs enable different actors to access malware and use them to attack vulnerable computers. This article presents an economic rationale for the existence and continuity of VBMs. It is assumed that buyers and sellers decision to trade in the black markets depend upon their perceived costs and benefits. As long as the expected utilities of engaging in the black markets are higher than the costs, buyers and sellers will continuously trade in VBMs. A system dynamics (SD) model is developed to capture such problem. Concepts from market-for-crimes theories are adopted into the model, since they provide a useful perspective for explaining criminal behavior such as in VBM.