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Abstract

Described systems and methods allow software introspection and/or anti-malware operations in a hardware virtualization system comprising a nested hierarchy of hypervisors and virtual machines, wherein introspection is carried out to any level of the hierarchy from a central location on a host hypervisor. An introspection engine intercepts a processor event occurring in a virtual machine exposed by a nested hypervisor, to determine an address of a software object executing on the respective virtual machine. The address is progressively translated down through all levels of the virtualization hierarchy, to an address within a memory space controlled by the host hypervisor. Anti-malware procedures can thus be performed from the level of the host hypervisor, and may comprise techniques such as signature matching and/or protecting certain areas of memory of the nested virtual machine.

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First Claim